Stories of Nightmares Past
by Sei-sama
Summary: Many know the story of how a skeletal Pumpkin King came across Christmas, and loved it so much he almost ruined it. But still, questions were left unanswered. You are about to find out the past of Jack, Sally, and yes, even the nefarious Oogie Boogie.
1. Holidays, and the Creations Of

Haaaiii! It's the almighty and ultra-cute Sei-sama speaking! I'm supposed to be working on a lot of other stuff like an essay and homework and other stories I promised to write, but oh weeellll! Hahaha I know, I'm such a bastard.

Anyways, I got totally addicted to Nightmare Before Christmas after watching it again after such a long time. The thing was, the movie was short. Way too short. And left way too many questions unanswered. So I brought it upon myself to answer them and totally mutilate this wonderful movie forever! I'm so wonderful, aren't I?

So, this is the first chapter. The first part is sort of like an introduction kind of thing, and then it goes on to the real story. It's the Past, so far anyways. I might dabble in a little Future kind of stuff, but maybe not. Of course, I just had to do a cliche thing. I'm not going to spoil the cliche just yet 'cause you haven't read it. Meet me after the chapter. And review too.

* * *

_Holidays, and the Making Of_

Imagination can be a very powerful thing.

There is a clearing in an unknown forest with several giant trees, each with a large, painted door. All these doors are different, signifying a different holiday. A Christmas tree for Christmas, a Jack-o-Lantern for Halloween, a brightly decorated egg for Easter, a candelabra for Hanukkah, and so on. This clearing has never been found by anyone. Maybe it doesn't even exist. Maybe it's stuck between the delightful world of imagination and the cruel, heartless world of reality. Maybe the reason for this is actually very simple and not so mysterious.

Actually, the reason is because it was created out of imagination. Imagination can be a powerful thing, after all. It came from the head of one boy who suddenly wondered to himself about the origins of holidays. He would not accept the rational answers, though. Who cared about some old saint named Valentine? The much more interesting answers involved holidays having worlds of their own…he told all his friends about his ideas. Through the awesome might of Gossiping Children, the ideas passed and spread everywhere, even to the adults. It was refined, tweaked, and then somehow turned into reality. Everybody already knew it existed. There was no reason to try to find it. They had already seen it, went through the doors themselves in their dreams.

The holiday world we will explore in this story is the one of Halloween. It is known as Halloween Town. (Humans are usually not very good at naming things. There are many unfortunate children who are subject to this misfortune. Ever heard of Melvin Calvin? Really. What kind of name is that?) When these worlds are first created, it begins with a town or a village, just the basic land of the place. Then the inhabitants are created. Only a few, though. After that, the Halloween inhabitants took over, reproduced, so on and so forth. One may randomly come into being once in a while, but only rarely after the original creation.

In Halloween Town, a black and rather dreary place, the first generation that was created included the two-faced Mayor (this does not refer to his personality being traitorous. The Mayor is literally two-faced), the Behemoth, the larger witch, the vampires, Dr. Finkelstein, several ghosts, and the Similar (not identical) Hat Triplets. They were monsters – there was no doubt about that (they considered 'monster' a compliment) – but they weren't cruel, they were actually rather pleasant and nice. All they wanted to do was to scare and have fun. Halloween Town was small and had an overabundance of carved pumpkins, but they loved it anyways. If they needed more houses, they could just build more. There was already a graveyard handy and creepy woods and there was always a full moon, and it was never too cold, but cold enough to make you stop once in a while and just shiver.

The first thing they did was make the Mayor…well…the Mayor. The witches, ghosts, and vampires did not want the title. Dr. Finkelstein just wanted a creepy tower to study in. Behemoth, the large guy with the axe in his head, was in no state to lead anything. He hardly ever talked, and the axe seemed to have hindered his thinking ability anyways. The triplets kept arguing among themselves because the biggest was automatically considered the candidate, not the smaller ones, and they kept protesting against the "obvious prejudice of size". So the two-faced man was elected.

The first denizens were the only ones to just appear, full-grown and all. They didn't seem to age either. (Some of them were already dead anyways.) Over the next few generations, there were a few deaths. A vampire disappeared when he stepped out into the sun. (Last words: "Oh, come now, there is no need to be af-") One of the grotesque fishwomen died too. Dr. Finkelstein's early creations died in a way. They lost animation, anyways, and fell apart. Funerals were not as sad an occasion for Halloween Town, for everybody knew they all had to die some time. They may live long, but everybody goes in the end.

Jack, Sally, and Oogie Boogie came from one of the newer generations. Instead of being rebellious like kids usually were, the children of those generations were pretty well-behaved (in Halloween Town standards), though adventurous. A problem did come around because there was no school in Halloween Town, but since there wasn't much for them to learn, all the parents did was let them run around and drop a few tips on how to be scary.

Jack was the only animate skeleton in Halloween Town. Even in childhood years, he was rather tall and lanky and was mostly absorbed with his own little ideas. He really loved the place he lived in. Scaring people was fun, especially for children since it gave them something to brag about. ("Ha, I'm much scarier than you are!") He was polite and charismatic, but oddly, one of the scariest. Maybe it was because he could loom dramatically over all his friends, but anyways, it made him very well-liked and popular. A small witch with a very unfortunate large wart on her nose fawned over him constantly, and praise poured in from everywhere. Jack, being the immature five year-old brat he was, enjoyed the praise most of all and in response, did his best to be even scarier.

Sally was also one of Jack's admirers. She was one of Dr. Finkelstein's earliest and successful creations, though she had started off as a little girl only because the doctor decided (after many failures) to start off small. Being a prototype of sorts, Sally's design was rather simple. Her mouth was just a stitch and opened like a puppet's. Her dress matched her skin, multicolored and of various pieces of whatever the doctor had on hand. She was very awkward and could not walk very well, often tripped, and as a result, fell apart constantly. She had to constantly carry a needle and thread around in case of emergencies, but being young, her handiwork was not very good and she would fall apart soon after again. This proved very inconvenient when she watched the object of her child affection from afar, as then Jack would come over and she would grow flustered and embarrassed and quite possibly more pieces would fall off and she would lose a lot of dead leaves. (Some of those lost leaves would end up in her tangled, short, brown hair.) It was so troublesome to collect those, you know, even if there were so many of them around.

Oogie Boogie was one of the monsters who was poofed into existence out of nowhere even after the original creation of the town. As you probably already know, he was _The_ Boogieman. The one all the children feared the most. He was the guy you mistook shadows for. But when he appeared, he was just a small mass of bugs (and one snake that served as a tongue). He could move around and form a vaguely child-sized humanoid shape (no legs though, and hardly any arms), but it took much effort and he would slump back into a shapeless lump after a while. Many monsters stepped on him accidentally. The werewolf tended to do this more often for some reason. Also, it was hard for him to eat anything, as bugs are not so good at being teeth. He could only swallow things whole or drink soup and the like. So, Oogie was often found in a foul mood, snapping at anybody who came around. He was also quite the troublemaker. Because there was nothing holding him together except sheer willpower, he could sneak around at will. His bugs would travel around, hear some interesting things, and then he'd come up and ruin whatever it was. He was also quite scary, being The Boogeyman and all, but not as well-liked as Jack. Oogie loved scaring people as much as everybody else did, but he was a little reckless in his methods. (After he had covered himself up with some flimsy pieces of cloth, Oogie tried scaring somebody who was afraid of swimming by asking them to come by the fountain. He hid in the green slimy water and when they came by, he suddenly burst out, grabbed the poor creature, and pulled them both back into the water. Oogie was fine and the other was definitely scared out of their wits, but almost drowned too.)

Anyways, now with all our characters introduced, we might as well begin the story…

* * *

It was a not exactly horrible day. The orange sun glowed softly against the sky. (If you looked closely, the sun may just look like a glowing grinning jack-o-lantern. This is impossible, of course. Suns do not grin as they glide across the sky. Of course, the sun doesn't really glide across the sky, the lazy bastard – the Earth does all the work, spinning so quickly you'd think all life would have been shaken into space long ago.) It was midday. 

Oogie slumped and sighed against a dark, blood-stained wall. The holes in the wriggling masses of bugs that acted as eyes seemed to be glaring down at the cobbled streets, but it was hard to tell. He was sulking in the dank streets of Halloween Town because there was absolutely nothing to do.

Halloween comes only once a year, first of all, and though you can scare and poke fun of anybody at any time of year, it really depends if your victims decide to be scared or not and if you actually had ideas of how to scare them. Oogie prided himself on making something new each time and right now, he got nothing. So, he had sat outside his small, cold abode and fell apart and gathered himself up every few hours while he thought. Until a recognizably thin shadow fell upon him. The bug boy had no need to look up. Nobody could be as thin or as tall as Jack. It was odd that there weren't any flocks of admirers around him though.

"What do you want?" His voice came out gruff and gravely, much more deep than one of his age should be. Jack Skellington stood in front of him, empty sockets staring down at the wriggling mass, as if studying the monster sitting before him. Oogie got impatient and was about to stand up and form some buggy arms to show the skeleton man what's what, when finally he spoke up.

"You're pretty much alone all the time, aren't you? I've noticed a few months ago."

Oogie would have blinked, but sometimes shutting his eyes all the way got the bugs to stick together and he would have to force them open again, so he just narrowed his eyes a bit. "You juthh'd notith'd?" The Boogeyman had an unfortunate speech impediment. His snake tongue liked to slip out between the buggy lips as he made an 'sss' sound, so he sometimes 'ttthhh'ed instead. The snake also hissed, which sounded very weird, listening to two voices come out of him.

"Yeah. You're a new guy, right?" Jack replied, his voice soft and innocent and gentle. The skeleton man had always gotten on Oogie's nerves. One, he was popular. And two, he didn't even act like what he should act. Always soft-spoken and polite and yet, he was considered one of the scariest. Now he was insulting him even more by pretending that he wasn't even there for the last several years! Oogie turned eleven this Halloween, and he _just noticed him?!_ Now Oogie formed arms with a little effort and flowed himself upwards, trying to stretch his figure of insects so that he was at least as tall as Jack, but fell a little short. Oh well. You didn't have to be tall to beat somebody up.

Sounding angry and insulted, Oogie roared, "Get one thing ssstraight, _bone man,_" the nickname was spat out venomously. Some bugs had accidentally fallen off from the force of this shout and scuttled back into him. One actually flew into Jack's eye, which seemed to make him very uncomfortable, and he looked a little sick as he opened his white jaws to let it back out. "I've been here jutht about ath long ath you have. You don't have any _right_ to pretend I wazz never there all thossse yearssss, to act tho…" He didn't know the word he was looking for. Oogie searched his brain, and settled for one that just popped up. "…tho sssuperior. Trussst me, I'm a veteran compared to you at this ssscaring buzness. People only think you're tho ssscary 'cuzz they're blinded by your…" Oogie paused again, but this was for a different reason. He could feel his grip losing. His body of bugs was falling apart, every little pest wanting to go several different ways at once, their minds suddenly becoming many…he did not want to embarrass himself (more so than he was embarrassed by the snake that kept flitting in and out). The boogeyman struggled to keep himself together, but the bottom base was already spreading out into a pool of bugs and he sank into a puddle that stretched out on the street. He could see Jack scuttle back, surprised, and hear his black shoes clatter wildly on the cobbles in an attempt to get away and silently cursed those traitorous bugs that kept falling apart so often. If only he could just keep them all in one place without having to exert so much effort.

Jack was just staring down at him now. The look on his face was something of surprise, maybe. He had no idea what to do. He only came to make friends, as the bug guy always seemed alone. Of course, there were rumors about him, all of them bad and said with a condensing tone, but he ignored all that. Jack figured that this boy in front of him that had suddenly been reduced to a scuttling pile was just misunderstood.

Taking great care not to accidentally trod on any of the bugs now scurrying around, the tall skeleton boy bent down to where he thought the face would be. "Um," he said. What was he supposed to say in this kind of situation? "This happen often?"

Oogie felt only a little grateful that he could still speak in his large voice (Only a little grateful since most of the effort was going to pure hatred for the time being). Eyes and mouth formed with difficulty and he tried to glare up again, but ended up squinting instead. "Of courssse it doeth! Do you think it's eassy getting every ssssingle one of thesssse thingsss organized and together? There'th too many of them to count! And they all get dithtracted tho eassssily!" Jack could tell this thing was a very sore spot for him. Imagine having to constantly form and unform and reform himself several times a day. Must be tiring. The skeleton also couldn't help being distracted himself by the snake that flitted out and in so often and never got around to realizing that Boogie just wanted to be alone right now.

"Well, I was originally coming to ask if you'd like to hang out sometime. Nobody really comes around near you, so I thought you'd be lonely. You must be really scary to do that,"

"Of courth I am," interrupted Oogie, suddenly sounding proud of himself, despite the fact the flattering remark came from somebody he just now decided he hated.

"But I think I should help you first. There must be some way for you to keep yourself together all the time…" The skeleton blinked and narrowed his own eye sockets (which bewildered Oogie slightly: I mean, who heard of a skeleton that could blink?) in deep thought. His thin fingers tapped against the bottom jaw of his skull, which got on Oogie's nerves. He was tempted to ruin the skeleton's black suit, only because it looked so nice and neat. Really, what kind of kid dressed like that? He only saw adults, like the mayor, with ties and all dressed up.

"Aha!" Oogie might have jumped if he wasn't just a useless pile right now. "I bet Dr. Finkelstein can think of something! He's real smart, you know. You think you can pull yourself together so we can go to his place?"

"Yeah, maybe, if you stop talking long enough for me to actually _concentrate_." Jack did not seem to notice the annoyance that was practically dripping in his voice and just replied, "Splendid! You know, I've never actually been inside his house. I wonder what kind of stuff he has in there. Hm, you haven't gotten up yet? I know a faster way to do this. Let me get Sally…" Oogie was only genuinely interested when Jack mentioned the small girl. Why didn't Jack get some other of his countless admirers to help him? Sally was just an awkward little girl who broke into pieces a lot, sort of like him. In fact, why did Jack want to be friends with an outcast like him? He obviously couldn't be lonely with all those people crowding around him and praising him over and over again. Someone would have to be very desperate to make friends with The Boogeyman.

Jack had ran off somewhere, but it didn't take him long to come back, this time with Sally stumbling behind him and two large shovels and a wheelbarrow. Sally was much shorter than anybody her age, mostly because the doctor did not want to make new measurements and get new parts for her every year. It was much too bothersome. She was looking forward to when she became a teenager, the time when Finkelstein promised to give her teenager parts. She brushed the stiff brown hair out of her large eyes and looked curiously at Jack and at what she knew to be Oogie. The skeleton had ran up to her excitedly, first asking for the objects he now had, and then said something about helping somebody else and oh how much fun they would have and so on. Sally didn't really catch everything and was extremely confused as she tripped along behind him, once falling and losing an arm (which she held now). Looking at the bug pile, she realized that Jack wanted to make friends with Oogie, but couldn't for the life (or undeath) of her figure out why. The Boogeyman was a horrible boy who scared everybody. In the bad kind of way. Nothing good ever came out of him.

Jack stopped and set the wheelbarrow down, but picked up one shovel that was in it. Oogie peered curiously (or tried to) up, wondering what kind of idea the kid had. Sally just tried to quickly sow her arm back on, but she cried out with Oogie when Jack started to shovel all of Oogie's bugs into the wheelbarrow. "What are you doing?!" The individual bugs themselves started up a wild chattering and for once, Oogie sounded panicked.

"Don't worry, you'll be fine," Jack simply replied before sticking his shovel back in and taking more bugs away. But it was _not_ fine. Couldn't he see? He was separating his body! Taking it apart in small bits!

"Jack, wait, I think…" Sally started to protest in her small voice, tottering over to the occupied skeleton, but she was only given the other shovel. The zombie-ish girl looked up at Jack, who hadn't even spared her a glance, and looked down at Oogie, who was shouting at him to stop and shouting at her to do something. And so Sally did something. She started shoveling.

It actually didn't take long to transport every bug into the wheelbarrow (Oogie wasn't that big), and no bugs had died as far as they could tell. Maybe some were squished by Sally's arm falling off again, but Oogie had ceased to protest and was reduced to grumbling as then they finally scooped up the "head" part of him and pushed him over to Dr. Finkelstein.

The doctor had his head opened when they knocked on the door. His eyes were apparently small, as you couldn't see them behind the ridiculously tiny, black, round glasses perched on his beak-ish lips. He always traveled around in a wheelchair. He shut the head quickly when he realized the people at the door were guests and coughed, a little embarrassed. Showing your brain off publicly was like dropping your pants. "My my, it's Jack. How nice to see you! I didn't expect you to come," the scientist looked behind him. "Did Sally invite you over?" Ah, a comforting idea. He felt the girl didn't make enough friends. Too timid. (He had made a mental note to fix this problem for his next creations.) And what better friend to make than Jack Skellington? A wonderful boy, so polite and already so adapt at the scaring business at such a young age.

"No, father…um…" Sally started, but Finkelstein had then laid eyes on what was in the rusty wheelbarrow Jack was pushing. Oogie had, by then, pulled together enough willpower to at least form his head again, so his head just seemed to be floating on a sea of bugs. It sort of looked like the severed head on a dinner platter trick. "You!" The doctor jerked a gloved hand up in surprise, but mostly anger. Oogie didn't seem to really care and just stared back coolly as if saying, 'Yes. Me.' He looked like he was about to jump out of his wheelchair and just stomp on the head, but Jack stepped in between them.

"Please, sir, wait. I'm aware that there seem to be a lot of people who bear ill will…" Oogie would have rolled his eyes at Jack's manner of speaking if he could. How old fashioned. How well-mannered. He settled for groaning instead.

"You're darn right I bear ill will! That boy is no good I tell you! Why've you brought him here? I hope it's to ask me for ways to teach him a lesson he'd never-"

"No, Dr. Finkelstein, Oogie's my new friend."

"Never agreed to that," Oogie piped up, but was ignored. Jack just kept talking.

"It's just that he has a problem of holding himself together and when I was thinking of a way of solving this problem, I instantly thought of you, doctor. You're a genius, after all. I figured you could help us." Finkelstein's ego slightly inflated and he almost forgot all of his hatred to the mischievous brat. Almost.

"Alright. We'll we what we can do. Ha. I am a genius, aren't I. There's an easy solution to your problem, though. We'll need a lot of glue-"

"No!" Oogie snarled from his perch in the wheelbarrow.

"That was a joke! Do you think a genius like me would seriously suggest that?!" Finkelstein growled back. "Well, I think I've already gotten an idea. I can just take a corpse and we can just fill it up with him. Of course, it may take a while to take out all those unnecessary parts…bones…some organs…tell me, do you need muscles by chance?"

Oogie seemed to be rather happy at the idea of not having to fall apart, but still snapped at the mad scientist. "Do you _think_ I need muscles? I have my bugssss. Why would I need thothe thingsss?" Dr. Finkelstein sniffed disapprovingly, but continued, "Yes, yes, I suppose so."

"How much time will it take again, doctor?" Jack asked.

"I'd say around a week or two at least," replied the short man, which led to a rather rude outburst from Oogie. "A _week?_ Old man, I'm not gonna wait, ya hear?"

Another disapproving sniff. "But you see, this takes time. Ripping out all the bones and muscles and cleaning out the inside…and especially if you want to keep the eyes and nose bones intact…of course that depends on what type of corpse…well, I can cut the time down by simply skinning the corpse, but," Dr. Finkelstein observed the wriggling bugs in the wheelbarrow from behind Jack. "I'd say…it's only my opinion, of course, but the skin would rip from…all the contents that would be put inside."

"You thaying I'm fat, old man?" Oogie growled in response. "Lissssen, I thaid I don't wanna wait. Get it ready in a couple o' daysss at the mossst."

"In a hurry, are we? I don't think you're in the position to speak to me in such a manner. I can turn you down, you know, because of what you did, you rotten brat. Or maybe worse." (Oogie didn't like being threatened. It got on his nerves, especially when it was some old geezer doing the threatening. He was the Boogieman! Who would dare threaten him?!)

"What did he do?" Jack inquired.

"Oogie once snuck in when father was making something and moved the Electric Striker a bit so when father pushed the button to animate his creation, he was electrocuted," Sally replied softly. Even so, Dr. Finkelstein heard.

"My glorious brain was fried for three weeks! Paralyzed from the waist down, and it's all his fault! Years ago, I could walk, and now I have to travel around in this stupid thing! I could have been killed!" Finkelstein thumped his wheelchair. Jack nodded slowly, but this story still did not deter him from his determination of making Oogie his friend.

Oogie had been shaking from the time he was threatened (a rather weak threat too), but it turned out he was shaking from laughter. It rose into a deep throaty laugh. "But you aren't dead, you're alive and walkin'…well, rolling. Why're you making thuch a fussss?" This only angered Finkelstein even more.

"Doctor, are you sure you can't do a faster job of it?" Jack spoke quickly, but calmly, hoping to sooth the doctor.

"If he wants some sort of container so that he wouldn't fall apart so often, then he has to realize that suitable containers take time to prepare! I can't just whip one out of nowhere, you know!"

"Actually, father…" Sally looked down and kicked shyly at the stony floor, but the seams around her ankle threatened to snap so she stopped. "You can make a much simpler one…" There was a long silence and Sally realized she was expected to elaborate. "W-well…I mean, you don't need a corpse, do you? You can make something more quickly…sew together something, maybe…"

"Yes, yes…" Finkelstein nodded his beaked head thoughtfully. "Good thinking, Sally. Not like I expected anything less from you. Well, I have an idea now, and this time I can probably finish it in a few days." Oogie started to say something but was stopped when Jack kicked the wheelbarrow loudly. "At least I'll finally have a use for those, anyways. Come on in." The doctor maneuvered the wheelchair jerkily around and back inside. Jack followed eagerly. He had never seen a mad scientist's lab before!

It was rather disappointing at first. The scientist's home was cold and stony and tall, and there were a set of winding stairs off to the side that led up somewhere and also circled below the floor, but nothing else; the first floor was practically bare. The wheelbarrow clacked and jerked as it rolled, showing that the floor had not been laid evenly. Jack looked despairingly around at the very plain room, ignoring Oogie's cries of 'Watch out, idiot!'

"We'll have to go up…"

"Dr. Finkelstein, I don't think I can wheel this up those stairs," Jack interrupted.

"How do you think I get around, hmm?" Finkelstein harrumphed at what seemed to be an obvious insult to his genius and clattered over to a door that Jack hadn't noticed (only because it was in a darkened spot in the circular room). Further inspection revealed it to be an elevator. "I need to get some things from my room down below. Sally, give me your needle and thread and go down and fetch those useless things in my closet that had just been collecting dust all these years." Sally obliged, nervously pushing her bangs away from her eyes and taking out the needle from somewhere Jack and Oogie couldn't quite see. It was possible she just stuck it in her, like a pin cushion. It would be the most convenient, anyways. Then she stumbled down the stairs and out of view while Finkelstein led them into the elevator, which was also rather plain. And short. Jack had to duck his head and remain slightly stooped inside. Oddly enough, there were no buttons.

Dr. Finkelstein pounded the ceiling so that something that looked like a golden funnel-shaped mouthpiece (well, it used to be golden; the years had not been good to it and most of the golden paint seemed to have flaked off, which is a shame because it must have looked wonderful and impressive before then) fell out from a hatch. The doctor said into it, "Going to the lab!" and it echoed up to who knew where. The not-so-golden funnel thing echoed back a stony reply: "Yes, sir." Satisfied, Finkelstein pulled on the cord and the mouthpiece flew back up into its hatch. The elevator then shuddered and began to move slowly upwards.

"Who was that?" Jack asked curiously, looking up at the ceiling now with awe. Oogie didn't know why. It wasn't _that_ interesting.

"Him? Oh, another one of my creations," Finkelstein said proudly, taking Jack's awe to be another kind of praise. "Since _someone_ confined me to this chair, I had to find a way of going up and down safely, so I made him. I like to call him Goyle. He lives up in the attic and doesn't need to eat much except those occasional bats and rats that are roaming up there anyways, so he's content and well off, I expect. There're four floors, so we have to tell him which one, and all he does is pull a chain or let it go down slowly. I'm glad I made him. Do you know how exhausting it is to crawl up those long stairs?"

The trip didn't take long and when the elevator rumbled to a stop and Finkelstein opened the doors, Jack was grinning wildly. Well, he's always grinning, being a skeleton, but he was grinning more than usual. Now _this_ was a mad scientist lab. Dark. Cold. Stony. You could almost see the lightning flashing from nowhere. (For the record, the sky was cloudless that day.) Counters with vials and microscopes everywhere and mysterious labels on glass flasks and interesting machines everywhere. There was an especially huge intriguing one that was propped up on the ceiling that was very black, round, and menacing with a little stick with a smaller red ball at the end pointing to a large table with straps on it. There was nobody restrained in it. Yet.

Oogie sniggered when he saw the familiar machine (the image of the doctor's surprised and shocked (no pun intended) face back then was always enough for Oogie to start chuckling) and Finkelstein glared at him through his small glasses again. "I can still refuse, you know, or hand you over to those blasted witches to turn you into a toad," he warned, (another threat; really who did this guy think he was talking to? Weak and tiny meatbags?) and then Sally came up with a bunch of what looked to be brown, coarse sacks. Very dusty brown coarse sacks. Sally was sneezing as she pushed aside a clear area on one of the counters and set the load down.

"…You're going to shove me in a sack?!" Oogie's tone was somewhere in between anger and disbelief.

"Don't worry, Oogie. It'll be fine," Jack said, and Oogie really wanted to punch him then.

"Yes, technically, I'm going to 'shove you in a sack' as you so delicately put it. Now how many bugs are you made of?"

"Hundreds." Finkelstein scoffed.

"No, that won't do. Give me the exact total, so I can figure out the measurements. You don't want me to give you something too big or too small, do you?" (That one sort of sounded like a threat. Three strikes, you're out, right? Oogie made a mental note to do something later to Finkelstein.) Oogie was silent for a bit.

"I'd say higher than a thousand. Can't be sure."

"Can't you be more exact?" Finkelstein huffed. "I don't want to have to count all of them myself!"

This was starting to remind Oogie of those games. 'Guess the number of eyes in this jar!' "Um. Four thousand six hundred nine?" It was one of those few times Oogie sounded unsure, but Dr. Finkelstein accepted that answer with a small nod and jerked his way to the counter where the bags lay. He sat there, muttering calculations under his breath.

"Good, if that's the case, we have enough." Jack silently applauded Finkelstein at how quickly he had figured it out. Well, he was a genius after all. "Sally, get the scissors and the ruler." The short girl hurried to obey.

"How long did you say it would take again, doctor?" Jack asked.

"This job is laughably simple. I think now I can get it done by tonight. Now I don't want to see _your_ face again," Finkelstein pointed accusingly at Oogie, still in the wheelbarrow, "until it's ready. I'll send Sally to get you then," the doctor rasped before snatching the two objects from Sally. Jack realized he was being dismissed and started to wheel the wheelbarrow around.

"Do you really think I'm going to ssstand being rolled around by _you_ all the time?" Oogie grumbled. Bugs flowed out over the edges and then he was standing beside it. Jack didn't seem to mind he was out anymore. The wheelbarrow was now lighter anyways. He continued to wheel it to the elevator and Oogie followed after realizing he really didn't want to slither down the stairs. Jack tapped the ceiling politely with no problem and said "Ground floor, please."

"Sure," the stony voice grumbled, and the small elevator shuddered and started going down.

And then Oogie found himself with Jack, hanging out on a hill whose top twisted into a small spiral. He had no idea how _that_ happened. He stared at the pale skeleton sitting next to him incredulously, then realized that indeed they _were_ sitting next to each other, and a little close to, and scuttled away a little to the side. As much as the hill would allow him anyways.

While Oogie was thinking the past few moments over and over again, trying to figure out what had gone on in the time lapse that he couldn't quite remember (he didn't want to think that for a moment there, he had been overwhelmed and fell for Jack's charisma; there must have been a different explanation), Jack spoke up. He didn't appear to notice that Oogie had moved away. "I don't think we can do anything today, but what do you want to do tomorrow?" He was already talking like they were friends. When he had expressedly told him that he never agreed to that. The Boogeyman glared up at the night sky, into the full moon. (In Halloween Town, nights always came early and there was always a full moon.)

"I was planning on doing thomething to the old man," he replied casually.

"Oh, you mean Dr. Finkelstein?" He sounded so…cheerful. Oogie cringed. "Yes, I would want to thank him too, you know? It's really nice for him to do that for you." He couldn't be further from the truth. Oogie would have laughed, but he was too busy being annoyed by Jack. The boy beside him was just…so…off. Everybody called him scary, admired him, praised him, and hell, it probably wouldn't be a stretch to say they _worshiped_ him. And he was so polite. Good manners. Gentlemanly. What kind of scary guy was that? He gathered mobs of fans without effort. And Oogie was stuck alone, just as scary – no, even scarier – but stuck with the short end of the stick.

Yeah, he could probably admit it right now.

He was envious.

Alright, alright! He was envious _and _he hated Jack because the skeleton guy was somebody to be envious of.

"You say something?"

"No. Nothing at all."

"Okay then."

Halloween Town that night was very silent. It usually was silent anyways, to build tension and then break it when you pop out from your hiding place to scare whoever came by, but this was the awkward kind of silence. The bad kind of silence.

"So."

"So."

"What made you think you could make friends with The Boogeyman?" Oogie emphasized the 'The'. It made him feel better. People knew those who had a good 'The' was very important, and of course, he was definitely important enough to have that kind of 'The'.

"Well, you seem the kind of guy who wouldn't just praise me all the time, you know," Jack replied carelessly. He didn't seem to realize that Oogie had just worded his question as if they weren't friends.

"Ha. Of courthe not. I'd never do that," Oogie shot back disgustedly.

"It's boring just being praised. They're only interested in doing that, you know, and then I don't get to do anything fun. It'd be nice to be left alone once in a while." Oogie wondered why Jack was now telling him all this. Could it really be that he already trusted him? After only just meeting him?

What an idiot.

Then he wondered again where the usual flock of admirers were.

Then he realized the irony of it all and started chuckling, which turned into outright laughter, making bugs quiver and fall off and scuttle back again. Jack turned to him in utter bewilderment. Somehow his eye sockets widened, and his skeleton grin changed slightly to look like a mix between worry and confusion. It made Oogie laugh more because Jack hadn't realized it.

"…Are you alright…?"

"Y-yeah. Don' worry. Juss' a joke I remembered. Hehehe…Hang on, I'll stop soon…" Oogie's composure was still on the verge of breaking (he was sniggering through his closed mouth and his voice kept cracking) as he lay a buggy hand on Jack's shoulder. The skeleton didn't know whether to feel reassured or disgusted as the bugs wriggled. It felt uncomfortable.

"Ya know, (giggle) I re-re-really think (haha) we had more in common (snort) than I thought. I really hated (har) you before, but now I think I can ac-actually (guffaw) tolerate being around you."

It would have been a rather touching scene if Oogie didn't stutter from restrained laughter and paused in his soulful speech to chortle over his shoulder every so often. (Actually, it wouldn't have been very touching even if he wasn't laughing because of all the crawling gross bugs and stuff on his body that sometimes wriggled into Jack's shirt.) Jack stared back, expression still frozen in bewilderment, but he broke into a grin when he realized he was partly-sort of-hardly-not really accepted as a friend at last. "That's great!"

And Oogie Boogie and Jack Skellington became partly-sort of-hardly-not really close friends and hung out only-from-time-to-time-not-so-frequently from then on.

* * *

Yes, and that's the cliche. That little endy bit there. Where ZOMIGAWSH, THE PROTAGONIST AND THE ANTAGONIST WERE ONCE FRIENDS!!!! 

Okay, it's a little different, I guess. Oogie and Jack are _sort of_ friends. Not really. I mean, Oogie still dislikes him. But at least he can tolerate him! Hurray!

And there are many things I want to explain around Oogie and what exactly is a Boogeyman, because Oogie really isn't just a whole bunch of bugs clumped together. Nor, in the next chapter, will he only be a whole bunch of bugs clumped together in a bag. Let's see if I can manage to explain his whole being thing later on.

But for now, please review. Please. I'm begging you. Like Dr. Finkelstein, my ego needs a good rubbing. That doesn't mean I'm going to open my head and make you rub my brain. That's even worse than dropping your pants.

Review.


	2. In Which an AlmostApology is Made

Yes, it's me again. Second chapter didn't take so long really for some reason. I think I should write something else more creative as this type of plot gets used a lot, doesn't it? However, my sister will kill me if I discontinue, so I updated. I really should get a better summary, should I? Not good at writing those. Oogie's lisp is getting on my nerves as I always forget about it now and have to go back and change everything and the only explanation I can think for him to have gotten rid of it is he simply got better at controlling that dammable snake tongue as he got older. So, I'm stuck with his lisp for a while. Serves me right.

And I guess I should put up a disclaimer, though it's obvious I don't own Nightmare Before Christmas. If I ever somehow got to make a movie, I could possibly name it Nightmare Afore Christmas and own that, but I might get sued. So I won't try.

On with the story.

* * *

_In Which An Almost-Apology is Made_

"Ssso it'th done now?" asked Oogie eagerly as he trailed behind the stumbling Sally. Jack was behind him, walking with his usual spider-like grace, not as fast or as happy for his new not-so-friend, but happy for him anyways.

"Of course it's done!" Dr. Finklestein snapped back, jerking his wheelchair over to the finished product Oogie had been looking forward to for a long time. Or it felt like a long time. True to the doctor's words, the sack thing had been finished the same day the request came to him, but anticipation dragged out the seconds to minutes and minutes to hours, but hours did not seem like days 'cause that would just be plain exaggerating. "Do you think I would just call you here for idle chatter? I hate you, remember?" 

"Now, now, doctor…" Jack waved a long hand to calm everybody down. "Why don't you show us the fruit of your genius?"

"Oh really, it isn't much. Like I said, a simple job," croaked the scientist modestly, but his smile revealed that Jack's flattery was filling his ego again. He grabbed the coarse sacks that were so recently sown together and pulled it out with a flourish, as if about to show a crowd a wonderful new invention underneath, but this time, the cloth was what he was flourishing. Being so close to the ground, the brown material settled on the stone floor.

It really wasn't very impressive looking. Oogie stared at it critically and then stared at Finkelstein with all the air of a person raising a quizzical (and hypothetical) eyebrow. "It ain't much, alright." Jack nudged him (which was a big mistake since his elbow, for a few seconds, was actually inside Oogie and more bugs fell out) and walked up and held the thing that was supposed to hold Oogie together. With the skeleton's height, the thing easily dangled a few inches above the ground.

"You slip in through here," the doctor indicated the spot with a gloved finger, "and then I sew it up and your problem is solved. No falling apart. Even if you do relax your grip, the bugs can't go anywhere and you can still stay standing."

"Yeah, but what if I wanna get out of it again? Doethn't look like thomething I'd wanna ssstay in fer a long time."

"Squirm out of the mouth-hole or something. What do I care? Not my problem. Just go in so I can finish it and kick you out." Finkelstein waved impatiently at the bag thing, and The Boogieman sighed, realizing that this is what someone got for haste and slithered into the large hole. As he let his bugs fill all gaps, he realized grudgingly that it was much easier to move around arms now that he didn't actually have to form them. He moved the new appendages experimentally as the doctor sewed the back side up. He also noticed the man even got the eye and mouth-holes in the right places. It was actually a pretty nicely done job.

Instead of a compliment, Oogie said, "It'th tight."

"It has to be! If it wasn't, then when you get into one of those little…I dunno, bug puddle things, then the whole thing would start to sag!" Yes, sagging would look silly, Oogie realized.

"But it'll break when I grow," he retorted anyways.

"You grow?" asked Jack. Man, what an interesting friend he had! Or sort of had.

"Of courthe! I can gather even more bugsss if I wanted to, which would make me grow, and bugsss reprodusse all the time too."

"Y-you mean…" Sally would have giggled if she wasn't so scared of Oogie. "…You have eggs all over your…body…?"

Dr. Finkelstein did not miss a chance at poking fun at the boy he hated so. "Ha! If you can make eggs, then you're technically a girl!" He did not hesitate to laugh loudly and shamelessly and point at the rather humiliated Oogie. Alright, he definitely was going to exact revenge on the stupid short man. 

"Um…but…" Sally didn't know whether to stop her father's mirth and make Oogie marginally happier by explaining that really, every living thing was sort of making eggs, what with cells inside them reproducing all the time, though they technically weren't eggs, but anyways, it didn't make Oogie a girl or anything and so on. But it was too late. Jack was slightly bewildered for what was probably the umpteenth time and made a pose not unlike the Thinker, only standing. "I really came to you with all intention of making friends with the assumption that you were a guy…"

"I am!" Oogie replied hotly, feeling very wounded by Jack's doubt even though he still didn't particularly consider him a friend.

"Yes, yes, well, I'd better not detain you because of…recent ah…inquiries about gender…your business is done now, so leave…ha…if you please." Finkelstein sneered. It made him look even uglier. His lips curled up over his teeth and revealed his gums, which were black. But Oogie wasn't going to just leave now, not after being treated like this. He was going to make a fuss, at least. Raise the roof. Or something.

"Oh no, not yet. I don't like the way thisss looksss either." The now clothed bug boy crossed his arms (oh, it felt so satisfying to do that) and glared down at the paralyzed man. "I pride myself on how ssscary I look. Creepy, at least. And bugsss in a sssack, in my book, doeth not. Make. Creepy." He had rather liked the effect with the separated words in their own sentences kind of thing. It sounded sinister and threatening. Kind of like a 'take that' quality, maybe. And it was a nice surprise when he leaned down in what he hoped was a threatening manner, his snake tongue poked out to hiss menacingly and almost nip the doctor in front of him.

"Well…I think it's creepy…" Sally piped up.

"See? No need to worry. It's creepy. Now off you go."

"It's only Thally! Ssshe's the type to be creeped out by anything!" Well, it was true that he did not know her well, but she seemed like the type. Always talking quietly and shaking every once in a while and those big eyes always looking worried…

"I think it's sorta creepy too," Jack piped up from where he was examining weird green substances in vials. He managed to sound polite and distracted at the same time.

"You're just thaying that," Oogie shot back as Dr. Finkelstein rolled over to jerk the beaker away from Jack's bony hands. "I don't like embarrassssing myssself, old man, so I don't want to-"

"…It's creepy with the way it seems your…skin is moving…your bugs keep moving around and it shows and worms and stuff keep moving around in your mouth when you open it and it's creepy…" Oogie looked down. And sure enough, his 'skin' was moving in accordance to the bugs, making it look like his 'flesh' was crawling. Or something like that. It was mildly satisfying, but now he had no other reason to complain. At least he felt he had some of his dignity back.

"_Now_ will you leave?" asked Dr. Finkelstein. His large brow furrowed as he glared viciously at Oogie while setting the beaker filled with mysterious fluid down and pushing Jack away from his counters. "I'm very busy, you know." 

"Yeah, yeah," Oogie said, and slithered his usual way towards the elevator.

Or at least, he tried to. Instead, he found himself getting closer to the stone floor much too quickly for comfort. And then his face met the stone. And then he said, "Ow." 

Jack was at his side immediately. You had to help your almost-friends, after all. "Are you okay?" Sally had also teetered a little closer, but just stood back a bit, as if unsure what to do.

"Oh, what now?" Finkelstein did not have a generous amount of patience and with Oogie Boogie, his tolerance shrank remarkably. The scientist also rolled towards the lying sack and jerked to a stop besides Jack.

Oogie rolled over on his back and noticed for the first time something else. He didn't know how he never realized it before. "I have legsss," he said.

"Really, I hadn't noticed." The sarcasm was very harsh. Oogie could feel the remains of his dignity that he had gathered disintegrate into nothingness. "Did you think I wouldn't make legs? What kind of genius do you think I am?"

"Not a very obzervant one! I've never had legsss before! Jussst a base…thort of thing!" Honestly, Oogie himself was not sure how he had moved around. He had just found a way. The bugs just moved him where he wanted to go. It was a system that worked. And though he liked the thought of not having to fall apart every few hours, the movements of his bugs were limited now. He realized he couldn't flow like he used to, or grow taller or sink lower to the ground or anything. Now he had to worry about breaking seams and not sagging. He could probably let some bugs out only one at a time to do…whatever. Spying, maybe, at the most. "I've never actually_walked_!"

"Then learn. I've done my end, you have to do the rest on your own. Really, Sally learned basic movement almost immediately. She learned how to walk only a few hours after I breathed life into her." Sally involuntarily shuddered at the image that brought up.

"Well, excuuuuuse me for not being as thmart as sssome doll you just threw together," Oogie spat venomously, though this time no bugs shot out. If there was sarcastic wit to be thrown about, then he wasn't about to back down. "Who'd uv thunk; a genius thientist making a genius creation. Don't brag about her like ssshe's your actual daughter! All you had to do was put in those traits, take away and add things as you wished. She's really only a poorly sssewn-together rag doll! So, _doctor,_ where'd ya dig her, oh, let me correct myself. _Parts_of her up?"

Dr. Finkelstein was shocked into silence, but not for long. His disdain had completely disappeared, though. "W-well," he stuttered, nervously scratching his head and staring at the floor of his lab. "…I…I didn't _have_ to make her smart…" It was the wrong thing to say. Sally broke out of her own shock and ran down the stairs so quickly, it was a miracle something didn't just pull out of their seams. The short girl tried not to give in, but a short sob echoed as she threw herself down the long stairs, and eventually, out the large, forbidding, metal door.

And then Jack recovered. It was one of the first times Oogie ever saw him even remotely angry. "Oogie!" He cried reproachfully. The skeleton kid wanted to see if Sally was alright, so he tried to make the lecture quick. "That was extremely tasteless on your part." He stood up, still frowning down at the sack of bugs, and backed away. Dr. Finkelstein seemed to have just realized what had happened and snapped his beak shut and without a word, headed to the elevator. He opened the door and hammered the ceiling many times before disappearing below.

Oogie and Jack were alone now. "I hope you're happy with yourself." 

Oogie was alone. He just lay there, listening to Jack's footsteps as he hurried off to find Sally. A thump as his head relaxed and fell back on the floor. A sigh.

He realized by now he had no way of getting up, but didn't bother calling back Jack for help. He wasn't the type to call for help anyways. It would be a long time before Oogie would even attempt to get up off the cold, unforgiving, stone.

* * *

Just a rag doll.

Sally wiped away her tears as she clumsily stumbled her way to the graveyard. It was still dark. Foreboding black clouds came from nowhere, possibly hailing a storm. It would be very suitable for the mood she felt right now.

Of course, Sally always knew she wasn't a real person, just somebody made from bits of flesh and scraps of cloth. She also knew Dr. Finkelstein had all intention of fitting her with only the most perfect attributes. Lovely round eyes that shone bright. Thin and well-shaped arms and legs. Cunning and intelligence. Finkelstein was proud of what was so far, his most successful experiment, and with good reason. The fates of the others ended in un-animation.

The ghosts peered out from their underground tombs as she staggered past, then just sank back down, uninterested. 

Sally didn't like thinking about her origins too much. She always knew she was only something shaped like a girl stuffed with dead leaves. It really was a disturbing thought, really, to one day just be nothing, and then something. Who knows how many nights she had spent as a younger girl, turning over questions in her mind about where her being came from. What made up her personality and the way she thought of things. She did not want to think that she was only manufactured, that everything came from some jar of Finkelstein's. He was a great man. But he didn't understand how people thought of mad scientist's creations. Sometimes they were ran out of town with pitchforks and torches. Sally, of course, was not monstrous in any way, but she was too smart for her own good.

'Wow, that girl's so smart!'

'Of course she is. Finkelstein made her. Of course he'd make her smart.'

And there was the spiral hill. Nobody knew what it was made of. It was just a good place to hang out, have fun, and cry your heart out.

Sally mostly did the third thing on that list.

And then a white, skeletal hand patted her on the head. Sally looked up into the dark eye sockets of Jack. Then he withdrew his hand and plopped down next to her and just stared up ahead. As is normal with boys of his age, Jack had no idea what to do in these kind of situations. He was polite, but manners didn't help when somebody was crying like this, usually. So he found it suitable to just sit there while Sally shook and hiccupped and tried her best to stop the flow of tears.

"I-I'm sorry," she whispered. "I overreacted." If it were any other situation, she would be bursting with excitement with the love of her life up 'til now right beside her, but this really wasn't the time.

Jack could only say, "Its fine. That was a fine response." After a few seconds thinking, he awkwardly patted her on the back.

"That was a _good_response," Sally corrected after a few more hiccups. Although technically she couldn't since she was only filled with leaves and possibly a heart, she took deep, rattling breaths that sort of helped to calm her down. "'Fine response' doesn't sound right, though it is grammatically correct, nobody really says it like that anymore…"

"I see. I'll remember that for later."

"And Jack?" 

"Hm?"

"I don't think you should be friends with Oogie."

"Well, I can see why you wouldn't like him, I mean, that was rude-"

"No, I didn't like him before then…he's scary."

"Well, that's a good thing."

"No, the bad kind of scary. He's cruel." 

Jack didn't respond for a while. It was obvious even to him that Oogie Boogie wasn't a likable guy. "Well, then for the good of society, I'll change his ways," he said rather dramatically. The skeleton even stood up and rose a bony fist in the air. "It's very possible to do that, you know. A personality can change based on role models. I'll be a fine role-model to him. And then he'll be a good friend."

"Well…" Having read a lot of psychology books, Sally couldn't deny what Jack said with such enthusiasm. She couldn't think of another reason to convince him to stop his quest for a friend, which frustrated her and made her huff a little and set her head in her arms as if she was crying again. And with almost perfect timing, Oogie lumbered onto the scene and almost fell over on the awkward, stubby legs.

"I think I got it…" he muttered to himself before suddenly tripping into Jack's back. Jack rolled forward once and ended up on his back, legs dangling over the edge of the curve. As if the hill could tell, it straightened a little so his legs were level again with the rest of his long body.

Oogie got up quickly again and coughed, which made an unfortunate worm fly out. It immediately wriggled away into whatever material the curvy hill was made of. "Well well well," he started. He was saying it a little too loudly. "Fancy meeting all o' you here."

"This is a very large clearing and the hill is very tall," Jack pointed out from his position on his back. "You can see us from a fairly long distance away." That just made Oogie feel like an idiot.

"You didn't have to come to apologize to me, Oogie…" Sally whispered, which only made Oogie feel worse.

"Ha! Don't you know? The Boogeyman doethn't have to apologize. I came up here for a very different reason."

"And I suppose that reason is very secret and you cannot tell us what it is," Jack said politely, in the manner of one who is slightly sympathetic with another who had just provided a very weak excuse.

"Yes, that'sss it," Oogie quickly replied. Now satisfied that the whole problem was over with, he changed the subject. "Sheesh, you really didn't have to run away like that. Thothe were all directed to your old man, not you."

"….I know. But…I'm sorry, I couldn't help it. It's a touchy subject with me…"

"Then you shouldda thaid it sooner," accused Oogie. "Then I wouldda known." It was very flawed logic. Not that anybody was going to point it out. "But, I guess now I know. At leatht now I won't make the wrong person cry. Next time, it'll be your old man 'stead of you." This was the closest to an apology as he was going to get, and it was still very far from a proper apology.

At least Sally realized it. The girl brushed away her chocolate brown hair away from her eyes and smiled a little at Oogie. He may be mean and cruel, but maybe Jack was right. She certainly hoped so. "Thank you," she said.

"Huh?" Oogie had no idea why she was thanking him. The Boogeyman wasn't supposed to be thanked anyways. That implied he did something nice. And The Boogeyman wasn't nice. So he was about to correct her (in a rude fashion, of course) when Jack stepped in. He finally got off of his back and implemented Plan 'For the Good of Society, Convert Oogie Boogie' by standing (and towering above a little) by him and clapping him hardly on the back. "Don't worry, friend! We forgive you!"

"Urk. You. Urk. Do?" The two urks were because of the rather hard pats on his back that threatened to force him back to the ground. 

"Yes, of course I do. Because friends forgive. And we're friends. And it's the Good thing to do. The Good thing." Jack started laughing jovially, though it sounded fake, just like the way he was talking sounded fake. (You know those audio tapes of those "See Spot Run" books? And the sweet voices of airplane attendants as they politely tell you to buckle your seatbelts and force you to watch the safety videos that, chances are, you've already watched a hundred times already? You know the enthusiastic tone your dad uses when he replies to the questioning of the general "fun-ness" of a trip, "Sure, It'll be swell!"? That was the kind of fake tone we're talking about.)

"Ssstop talking like that. Oomph. You thound. Ack. Like those people that always sssay. Ugh. 'Have a nice day' in that irritating way. And you're patting me too hard."

"Sorry." Jack suddenly got busy with straightening his bat tie. He had no idea what to do now, since he was already satisfied with the part-apology and already tried teaching Oogie a short lesson in being a Good citizen. 

"…I can take off my head. Want to see…?" Sally and Oogie eagerly replied 'yes' as they had nothing to say for the time being and the silence was awkward.

The three then had a long conversation about whatever popped into their head. The topics ranged from scary tricks to things they would do come Halloween to Dr. Finkelstein, complaints of (courtesy of Oogie) to Dr. Finkelstein, contradictions to the complaints of (courtesy of Sally and Jack). Sally felt completely better by the time she got up and walked back home, a little more soothed about the weird idea Jack had gotten into his skull. Oogie didn't seem that bad anymore. He did partly-apologize, so he must have realized his bad ways and was trying partly-hard to correct them. It was a start, anyways.

And she smiled happily at the thought of Jack comforting her. After years of watching and wondering whether to approach…he actually approached her instead. It gave her…confidence. Sally didn't trip once on the way home (she actually skipped a little when she thought nobody was looking and sang a little song about how wonderful it was to be alive…um…animated anyways), where she made a nice bowl of stew for Finkelstein, who first, when he finally came back, pestered her with questions about her well-being, then gulped his dinner down and slept in his chair. Sally gently set a small, gray blanket on the old man and went back down to the bottom floor to check on her stock. She made a note to get more Wormswort and went up to her own room to rest or whatever it is animated flesh and cloth does at night.

Oogie and Jack went their separate ways as well. The bag of bugs, to his own little hideaway in the dark forest: a large tree with branches that clawed in the night sky. Or, more specifically, a spacious area below the tree. It was rather plain for the time being. He only put up wood for the walls and the floor, a big black vat with water in it, and a small circular table. There was also a large, yellowed paper tacked to one part of the wall with several names on it, most of them crossed out. Oogie Boogie realized he'd have to learn how to hold a pencil now, because inside a sack, his bugs couldn't just wrap around it tightly. Eventually, even though the name was already on the list near the top, he managed to slowly write Dr. Finkelstein in big, messy letters. Then he retired on the floor, making a mental note to build a bed now that he couldn't just simply become a puddle of bugs anymore and sit there. Was it a good idea to get this bag? Oh well.

Jack was making his way to the Skellington's tower, but was stopped along the way by several townspeople who, though on the way home by now, still spared a few minutes for the beloved skeleton. He tried not to show that he was feeling smothered by now after all the years of the same ordeal over and over as he chatted with the Gate Reaper, told Harlequin that yes, the new suit he made was indeed delightfully horrible (in the good way), and finally found out the names of the two witches (they were Zeldaborn and Helgamine). When he finally got away from the Hanging Tree, the Mayor bustled up to him.

The Mayor was always a very simple man. He was shorter than Jack, though his tall black hat did stand a little bit higher. He was stout and conical in shape. He always saw things as black and white. Good and bad. It slightly fit him, as he only ever seemed to be delightfully overjoyed or woefully anxious, as depicted by his faces. As he scuttled towards Jack and righted his spider bolo tie, Jack could see that the kind Mayor was quite anxious right now.

"Jack! Jack!" He called, though there was no need to shout. He was very anxious indeed. The pale, frowning face peered up at him from below the crooked hat. The Mayor often told Jack how proud he made the town and repeated that he was destined for great things indeed, which may be why he came as a little overprotective of Halloween Town's shining star. 

"Yes?" The suited skeleton stopped for about the fifth time and politely nodded at the Mayor to continue.

"Jack!" The conical man repeated once more. "Is what Dr. Finkelstein told me true?"

Jack frowned in confusion. "Can you please explain…?"

So, the Mayor took a deep breath and, still dismayed, related to him how the doctor had rolled up to him in quite a rage and asked if he had seen Sally and the Mayor replied jovially, no he had not and swung to his pale face and asked if something was wrong and the doctor replied there was and said how the little brat Oogie made trouble again and upset dear Sally which made the Mayor distressed don't you know because the Mayor always had to look out for the townspeople's well-being and he asked what Oogie, that little conniving monster (in the bad way, mind you) had done now and so Finkelstein complained how Jack came to him with the bugs in tow and the Mayor himself interrupted – 

Deep breath.

Excuse me, Jack was with Oogie and Finkelstein nodded and continued how Jack wanted him to do something for Oogie but then he wasn't quite listening to the doctor because he was worried about why Jack was associated with the black sheep of the town.

"Please Jack, tell me you aren't actually interested in what he does…Do you know he once gagged and tied me up on a tree upside-down in the middle of the night? And I stayed up there for hours! I had such a headache afterwards! And that's not all! He tied me very high up. Good thing the rope didn't snap or my head would have definitely cracked!"

"Mayor, you don't have to worry about a thing," Jack assured him. "I came to him in hopes of finding a friend, I admit, and I found that he is a poor soul in desperate need of guidance. I believe that I can help him become a better Boogeyman."

"He's bad, through and through…" the Mayor mumbled, but managed to put up a fake smiling face up. "I'm glad that that's the only reason then. Everybody knows that we could do without his…antics. I wish you good luck, Jack."

The Mayor watched Halloween Town's beloved skeleton continue to his house, making sure that his rosy, smiling face was kept up even as the young boy tossed a coin to the street players nearby and stepped through the gates. As soon as Jack disappeared from view, the Mayor scuttled away and clicked to the pale, frowning face. He did not speak of the secret misgivings he had of the whole idea.

Oogie Boogie was a bad (in a bad way) kid. The Mayor felt in his gut that he would always be bad, through and through. 

"But," he sighed out loud to himself as he got into his Mayor-mobile and slammed the door shut, "it's only a gut feeling…Jack can do it…he's a capable boy…" It was obvious by the face he put on that he didn't believe what he said one bit.

* * *

Chapter END!

Ha, the Mayor is lovable. I like Oogie Boogie more, for some reason, but the Mayor is...I dunno. Cool. Maybe I think so 'cause I've read The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde recently. Speaking of which, I just found out that the Similar Hat Triplet's real name is (are?) Mr. Hyde. Silly me. I'm a horrible fan.

But anyways, he's so nice and round and I love his voice. I never heard of his voice actor, though, but he's awesome. So is Ken Page. I laughed my head off when I found out his role in All Dogs go to Heaven. I made my sister listen to that song, Let's Make Music Together, and I possible scarred her temporarily.

By the way, please review. Tell me that this is uninteresting, horrible, or unimaginative, but just review.

I'm going off now to listen to Let's Make Music Together.


	3. In Which Oogie Angers Someone Again

Chapter three dooonnnneee...

Went to Boston and it was okay, only too cold. And it greeted me with chapped lips, a cold thing, a throat thing, and an ear thing. Lovely. I'm not sure whether I can hear out of both ears anymore.

On that note, I'm very sure all of you know I don't own Nightmare Before Christmas because I'm mutilating the wonderful story plot beyond comprehension. I mean, the mutilation is so mutilating that you can't even call it mutilating anymore. There's probably a special term for this level of mutilating but I don't know it.

I also randomly made random references in this chapter for some reason. Not a lot, just a few. And there may be some confusing bits, but just go with the flow. I'll explain aaalllmmoooossst eevveerrrryyythhiinnngg...

And Oogie's lisp still irks me. I will have to shoot it soon.

* * *

_In Which Oogie Boogie Gets Someone Angry. Again._

It was three months to Halloween.

Jack could hardly find time to find Oogie for a few days afterward. News spread like a really bad and very contagious disease in small towns like Halloween Town and he had to calm everybody down and assure them ten times over that no, he wasn't going to join Oogie in dunking everybody in tar and feathers or something, but yes, he was going to try to make him a better Boogeyman and that there was absolutely nothing to fear.

Even so, people made time from their preparations for Halloween and kept trying to come up and offer stories of what Oogie had done to them, most of which ended in 'Thank goodness that' something or other 'didn't happen, else I might've died' or something along those lines. It was only then that Jack finally realized all of Oogie's 'pranks' were rather…risky.

The townspeople stopped eventually though (Halloween was close, after all and they needed to get ready), and as soon as he found an opening, Jack leapt for it. The day he was going to hang out with Oogie once more, Jack took a long, relaxing soak in a large tub filled with milk. (Jack has a belief that milk helps strengthen his bones. Although it is true, you do not bathe in milk to strengthen them, you drink it, which Sally would have told him if she knew of this practice.) He also ate a nice breakfast (all alone) of a blackened banana and something crunchy he found that he could not identify. (Do not ask where the food goes once he swallows. For that matter, do not ask where it goes out.)

Jack did have parents, but they weren't skeletons. (It would be very hard for two skeletons to make love anyways. Jack turned out to be a skeleton on his own. Some people theorized it was because of his mother's daily intake of acid, but nobody could really tell. His father is a rather crooked and spindly man who disappeared one day and his mother was a stout, squinty, bulbous and ugly. She could probably be best described as a demon penguin. And if that doesn't seem all that scary, then you haven't met her. She's hardly home because there was an accident during her usual breakfast of acid.)

As soon as morning rituals were done, Jack set out on his quest to find Oogie and hopefully figure out where he lived. He walked out of his tower with a determined look on his face, strolled around for a few minutes, and saw Oogie. Well, that was easy.

Jack then noticed that they were near Finkelstein's house again. He also noticed that Oogie wasn't in his sack thing. It hung around his…buggy…arm…things. "Hey, Oogie!" The skeleton waved a long arm.

"Oh, it's you," was the sour reply. The kid Boogeyman couldn't help but think there was suddenly a smell of…stale milk in the air.

"First of all, before I forget, where do you live?"

Oogie, having only expected Jack to inquire what exactly he was doing, replied, "I hit a growth spurt over the lassst few days and the theams ripped." It took a few seconds for his mind to catch up with the actual conversation. "Oh. Well. Under a tree."

It was then Sally walked out, almost tripped, and then noticed the two boys. She waved shyly and looked at the sown sacks in Oogie's arms. "…It ripped…? Well…um…father is busy right now. He's making a new creation to help around…" It was for a slightly sexist reason. Dr. Finkelstein began to think that such a delicate little girl couldn't help around with his work and so on and so forth. "I think he said he was calling it Project Igor…um…If you want, I can fix it."

"You fall apart all the time, though. If I let you do it, won't I just be coming back again a few daysss later?"

"Um…I'm much better now…" Before any more feelings could be hurt again, Jack stepped in.

"Well! Why don't you get some more sacks and then we can go over to Oogie's place? I've always wanted to see it and we can talk here…"

"And those thtupid people behind us won't ssstare at us anymore," finished Oogie grumpily. Jack looked up and noticed for the first time that several people were there, staring and whispering. Apparently, they still weren't convinced. The Corpse Couple hurried away when they saw Oogie glaring at them. "Okay, let's go. Get some ssstuff quick and I'll take you over."

* * *

"It's a horrible (in the good way) place," Jack commented cheerfully as he carefully crossed the old and shaky bridge. "It almost looks like a bottomless pit down there."

"It probably could be. I dunno. I jusss' found this place as it is. The previouth ownersss tried t' make a tree-house up there; you can see it's half-finished." Jack looked up and saw nothing, but took his friend's word for it. "Alright, jusss' slide down 'ere…" Oogie disappeared into a hole in between the giant roots of the tree. Sally followed after a little hesitation, carrying several sacks, and then Jack went down as well. He slid down a slide carved out of dirt that was generally smooth except for one rock that really hurt when he slid over it. As soon as the skeleton was back on his feet again, he brushed off all the dirt on his suit.

"Here y' are," said Oogie with a flourish. "'Ss ssorta plain though. Nothin' thpecial." This morning, he managed to add a not-so-well-made bed that was already threatening to fall apart and a chair near the table.

Oogie had never had guests around, so after saying that, he had no idea what to do. What was he supposed to do anyways? Entertainment? Or something?

"Don't worry, it's fine. I like it. It could be a little bit bigger, honestly. Hey, I bet I can help you with that too!" Before Oogie could stop him, Jack was already walking around, muttering things to himself that sounded like "Yes, there should be a window here, maybe some statues…expand the place to add some…"

"Before making plans, he thould really consssult me," Oogie complained to Sally, who just sat down in the only chair and started sewing. "I don't want any changes. Humph."

"He may have a little trouble listening to others," Sally conceded as she started sewing up the rip in the large sack-bag thing. "But I think it's nice how he's always eager to help out others…"

"He wantsss to put a fountain down here. Like the one in the town center."

"Okay, so maybe some of his ideas…are sort of…out there…" Sally removed some seams so she could add on a little more so it would be able to fit Oogie. "…but he always means well. He has a good heart."

"If ya ask me, I don't think he has any heart. Or any other organths, for that matter."

"And we should finish that tree-house up there too!" Jack finished and turned around, grinning happily. "…though this will take a long time…okay, first we should start off simple, huh? Let's make the window there and expand, and then we'll start on the tree-house."

"Have it ever occurred to you that maybe I don't want you barging in my home and trying to improve it? It's fine ath it isss."

"Great! I'll do the window now! The tree-house will be such a cool place to hang out!"

"…I thought so." With a loud sigh, Oogie let his bugs flow a little more outward so he sank towards the ground. "He'll thtop soon, right?"

"I don't know. He can be very determined if he wants to," Sally replied. "I'm finished now, I think. If you hit another growth spurt though it'll probably rip again."

"Ha, then I probably won't have to worry 'bout that for a while. Growth spurts don't happen often." There was a sickening cracking sound. Jack was tearing off some of the wooden boards that served as a wall to get at the dirt.

"I think I need a shovel," he called back, tapping the layer of dirt that was beneath the wood.

"Right, I'll get mine."

"You had a shovel?" Sally asked after Oogie flowed out somewhere to grab a rather hefty spade from outside and handed it to Jack.

"When I found thith place, it was a little sssmaller and I wanted it a little bigger," Oogie simply replied as Jack started stabbing the wall with the spade with small grunts. "Now help me into the thtupid sack." There was a little bit of grunting as Sally did so. The sack was not as tight as the doctor made it, but he didn't seem to be sagging at least. "Ah, feels much better." Nice not to have to worry 'bout where all these bugs go.

There was then a resounding crack and what would be considered 'light' in Halloween Town lazily drifted into Oogie's room. "There!" exclaimed Jack from his perch, looking slightly pleased at the vaguely circular hole in the wall he had just made. "Could use some bars, but I can get some later. Why don't we expand this place a bit now, hm?"

"No. A window was okay, but no major changes."

"But you-"

"I don't want to go to thleep with walls torn down in my house."

"…Tree-house?"

"Are you a workaholic or thomethin'?"

"…I just thought you would like it," Jack said bashfully.

"Well, I don't care either way. But do it later. Didn't you say you wanted to do something today?" Jack never said anything of the sort, but still replied to Oogie's immense relief (all this helping was getting on his nerves), "Oh yes! I've found out about a place in the forest where nobody goes…." Oogie had to admit the effect Jack inflicted on his voice was a nice touch. "…Creepy, isn't it? Let's check it out."

"…Are you sure…? If everybody's avoiding it…" Sally twisted her fingers nervously. "I mean…it's dangerous, right…?"

"Sounds cool," Oogie grinned. Now this was the kind of Jack he liked. Adventurous, and other stuff like that. "Let's go now, then."

"I don't think it's a good idea…" The two boys ignored Sally and crawled out of Oogie's home. Sally sighed, sorely tempted to just leave them, but ended up tagging along. She would honestly rather spend the day with Jack than with her father, though Finkelstein was nice too, in his own way.

And so that's how the trio found themselves in the dark forest, wandering around, looking for a certain place nobody wanted to go.

It was getting dark again. "Oh, looks like we can't find it. We should go back now, huh?" Sally giggled anxiously as she clutched on to Jack and peered around with large eyes. This was really scaring her.

"Don't be silly, we're almost there." Jack didn't seem to notice how absolutely terrified Sally was. Even if he did, he would probably think that was a good thing. Such is the life of Halloween Town.

Oogie didn't notice Sally's fear either. He was too busy looking around for whatever it was that even adults were afraid of. "Humph. Nothing thpecial yet," he complained. Was it really that easy for grown-ups to get so scared?

"Well, according to what I've heard, the place should be right…about…here." Jack immediately tripped over a small tombstone, making Sally fall down with him. A few dead leaves flew up and slowly drifted back down to the ground. Oogie laughed at them both, then moved one of Jack's lanky leg to get a better look at the tombstone. "Is this it?"

"Um, I think so. This should be the place…" Jack said, slowly getting up and dusting his suit. "I mean…we passed the Hanging Tree's old home…and the funnily-shaped rock…"

"Really disappointing, if ya ask me. Whose tombstone is this anyways?" A quick glance told him that the stone was blank, if not rather lumpy. "Must be an old ghost's home," he finally said, though even a tombstone for a ghost had their names on it. (They found that without names, it was rather hard to find where you were supposed to rest. Before carving names on them, the ghosts had to resort to the 'Finders Keepers' method.)

"It's still weird that it doesn't have a name on it. Hm." Jack knocked on the tombstone and said quite loudly, "Anybody home?" There was no response. The skeleton also tried tapping on the ground, but no ghost popped out to scream at them or anything. "Maybe it's out somewhere else and going to come back soon. Or maybe we're too late and it moved?"

"Ha, tho this is what everybody's avoiding?" Oogie sneered before kicking the tombstone roughly. The roughly carved stone seemed to move slightly. Luckily for Oogie, he had no toes to stub. (But his foot still hurt.)

"Oogie, it's not…nice to…you know…do that to graves…even if it's uninhabited…"

"Ah, who's gonna know?" Oogie kicked some of the dirt and leaves onto the grave and turned around, trying not to limp. "C'mon. This was a wathte of time. I dunno 'bout you, but I'm going back home."

Jack was frowning, disappointed. "I really was hoping for this to be something cool to do," he said sadly. The three trudged back towards Oogie's tree, and then went their separate ways. That day, they were supposed to start getting ready for Halloween (at least a little), actually, so they crammed in what was left of the night to practice and prepare and so on.

"Oh Jack?" The Mayor had by now, stopped bugging the skeleton boy about Oogie. As he scuttled towards the scaring prodigy, he held several rolls of paper, obviously plans for Halloween. "You being the honorary scare-er, having won many awards and all…I must go over the parts you have in this year's Halloween celebration. Of course, you will have some pretty big parts during the big party we'll have…" And so these things went. Jack found himself going home with several pieces of paper to memorize. There would be a rehearsal sometime.

And that was why when Oogie lumbered nervously towards Jack the next day, he found the skeleton walking back and forth muttering random lines to himself. "Hey! You!"

"'For it is time again-' oh, hello, Oogie. What is it?" Jack sounded a bit distracted once again. It seemed to be quite a constant state for him. "Do you think I should have said that with a deeper tone…?"

"Who cares?" Oogie replied bluntly. "Listen, have you been messing 'round my house?" The Boogeyman looked accusingly at the skeleton, though the effect was lost as Jack paced around, not even sparing him a glance. "'Cause if you have, it ain't funny! That thtupid howling kept me up almost all night!"

"Oh, howling…right…'Full moon in the night…'" Finally, Jack seemed to notice his almost-friend. The stack of lines he was rehearsing was set aside for the time being. "Hello, Oogie," he said again. "There's a loose string down by your foot…"

"Oh, Sally ain't that good, remember? I've had to cut a lot of thothe off this morning." Oogie bent down to rip off the loose string and straightened himself again. "Her theams are thorta loose, but I found out I can do stuff like this:" here, Oogie swung the little nub on top of his head in front of him and the seams ripped open to reveal a spider. "Cool, huh?"

"Cool," Jack agreed, nodding happily. Oogie suddenly remembered what he was angry for just a minute ago.

"Well, I guess you wouldn't do anything like that," he said thoughtfully since he wasn't so angry anymore.

"Do anything like what?"

"Last night, after finding that abandoned gravestone, I went back home and stuff to go to sssleep. Only I couldn't. 'Cause some thtupid thomething-or-other kept howling and keeping me up." Oogie huffed and leaned against the closest thing, which happened to be the Hanging Tree. (The Hanging Tree represents all the trees that people are hung from. The skeletons hanging from his branches are the thousands of people hung from trees, of course. Not one of them have a good sense of humor and often tell random puns about 'hanging around'.) The large tree slowly turned around to grumble at whoever leaned on him, but found it was Oogie Boogie and slowly walked the other way. (Oogie had once set fire to him as a joke.)

"Oooh, a mystery, huh?" Oogie could swear Jack's eye sockets were gleaming with excitement. "Mysterious howling? Maybe it's one of the wolfmen?" Oogie realized suddenly that Jack was going to pursue a career of a detective today, probably because he thought it would be fun.

Well, he'd have to play along. "Nah, the howls were different."

"Hmmm," Jack thought for a moment, obviously enjoying the whole thing. "A dog?"

"Pfft. You know we don't have dogs here." A dog just wasn't Halloween-ish. In fact, Halloween Town didn't have any animals whatsoever, unless you counted wolfmen-and-women and fishmen-and-women and so on. Halloween had a kind of style, and it didn't have room for animals. Except for black cats, of course, and as far as anybody knew, there was only one of them that wandered in and out of town every Halloween. It probably had an owner somewhere in the Real World.

"That's true. And the Grim Reaper doesn't bring any here, so there aren't any ghost or zombie dogs. All dogs go to heaven, not Halloween Town. It's probably whatever was in that gravestone you kicked."

"But that wath empty…wasn't it?"

"We must investigate!" Jack announced and to add a little effect, he raised an arm high. "Maybe we'll pick up Sally."

"Why?" grumbled Oogie.

"She knows a lot of stuff. She can help us. Let's go over to Finkelstein's place."

It just so happened that Sally was just sitting outside her house. There seemed to be some shouting going on inside, most of it from Dr. Finkelstein. "Daddy finished making Igor, but he realized he has to housetrain him after Igor almost bit my arm off and attacked the Mayor when he visited," she said by way of explanation.

"Oh, well do you want to solve…a mystery with us?" Oogie almost sniggered at the way Jack said it. Like it was the most wonderful thing ever and that it would be a horrible mistake to miss out. It really was only a bunch of howling.

"Sure," Sally replied, looking marginally happier at the prospect of doing something other than listen to her father shout at Igor (who was at the moment, answering the call of nature on the carpet).

"Don't get too excited," said Oogie. "It's only a bunch of howling that kept me up at night."

"Must have something to do with the gravestone you kicked," Sally immediately said.

"Why, I had the same idea just a while ago," Jack replied amiably.

"Why doeth everybody just athume it's my fault?! Jussst becauthe I kicked a gravestone _that was empty, I remind you,_ and got bothered at night by howling the sssame night, doethn't mean they're related! It could be cointhidence, far ath you know!" Oogie roared and stormed around a bit. It took a few minutes for him to cool off again.

"That's true," Sally agreed, looking reluctant at doing so for some reason. "Have you thought of going back to the gravestone and looking at it again?"

"We'll do just that!" It was then Sally remembered, rather inconveniently, that she was still afraid of that part of the forest. So when they arrived and finally entered the woods, she started clinging to Jack again. Solving mysteries could be scary (though still better than listening to Finkelstein shout at Igor for defecating on the carpet).

"And here we are!" Jack dramatically pointed to the mossy and badly carved rock. At least he didn't trip over it this time.

There was one thing different about the place though. Only Jack didn't seem to realize it. The skeleton carefully examined the old gravestone while Oogie and Sally looked around carefully, looking for the one thing that seemed…off. "You know, I think if you look carefully, you can see remains of some carved words…"

"Uh…Jack…?"

"It might be just me, though, but between those lumps over there, it looks like 'Scraps'."

"Jack…"

"Maybe we should dig the grave up? I mean, if it's really empty, there shouldn't be any worry or anything."

"Jack!" Sally urgently whispered to where the skeleton's ears would be if he wasn't a skeleton. "There's something over there…" And finally, all three watched something white in the distance. The white thing didn't move, and possibly was staring back at them.

"Well, it isn't howling…" Jack said hesitantly, and began to approach it. Sally, too transfixed by the white thing to be scared anymore, slowly followed. Some crunching leaves behind her indicated that Oogie was lumbering behind clumsily.

As they got closer, they could see it was definitely a ghost, and it was in the shape of a dog. "But dogs don't come here!" Oogie protested as quietly as he could. The three had unknowingly huddled together now, and though this was certainly something suspicious and one of those things that parents always told you to avoid, they shuffled closer to the dog-ghost-that-was-not-supposed-to-be-here.

"Maybe it's lost?"

"Grim wouldn't be happy with you if you said that in front of him. It suggests that he didn't do his job properly."

"Well…all dogs are supposed to go to heaven. Maybe it came back down?"

Oogie had been quite the past few seconds because he was too busy noticing something. The ghost-dog was growing as they approached. Of course, objects tend to grow in size as you approached simply because you got closer, but the ghost-dog was also looking a lot shaggier and its teeth sharper than it did only a few steps back. It was also now growling very dangerously, and the growl grew in volume the closer they came. "Jack. Sally. Thtop." The trio halted. "Watch that thing carefully…and step back…" As one, the trio walked backwards. The dog got smaller and a lot less threatening. It even had a cute little light as a nose. "…step forward…" Threatening. Menacing. Sharp teeth. "…step back…" They repeated this several times. It was like one of those small card things that you had to look at in several ways to see the thing it was supposed to show, which was generally the illusion of movement.

The dog-ghost had been watching them and growling whenever they got too close, but now it seemed to grow impatient. It howled. The three froze immediately. It was just that kind of howl. The thing is, it wasn't a good idea to stop even though an instinct says so, because then the dog grew to its full size. If you want to know how big the full size is, I will just say this: it's huge.

Think of two holes for eyes, like ordinary ghosts have. Then think of a huge wolf-like thing staring down at you with them with gleaming sharp teeth and long claws and a swishing long tail that looks big enough to crush you and hold you down. This is the wolf form of a werewolf ghost. Not a normal werewolf, though. This was a dog that was bitten by a werewolf, not a man. Because of overdose of feral canine genes, the dog dies (sometimes explodes into little canine bits), but its ghost is a rather fierce beast. Because it's not exactly a werewolf ghost, nor is it a ghost of a dog, and it's just silly to call it a wolfdog, it shall be hereon referred to as a dog-wolf-ghost-thing or something along those lines.

Ghosts usually don't have a lot of detail. Jack noticed that when the dog-wolf-ghost thing bent down, eye socket-to-teeth, that he could see every individual hair of it, as well as the gums of the teeth as it snarled at him, and drool. And though ghosts don't smell, he could smell the fetid breath.

"I think this is the thing that howled, Oogie." The trio retreated a step. The dog-wolf-ghost thing took a one-fourth step forward, which was equal to a step in the trio's terms.

Oogie opened his mouth to voice a snappy reply, but when the dog-ghost-wolf thing lunged its head toward them, he ended up screaming instead. The trio turned as one, and fled. Jack jumped over the lumpy rock-tombstone. Giant ghosts don't bother with doing things like that. The thing behind them just phased through it, as ghosts often do. However, Jack noticed, it seemed to be bringing down quite a lot of trees.

"But ghosts don't do that!" The skeleton protested as loudly as he could in the middle of screaming. "They only go through things! And moan!"

"Maybe it doesn't know that?" Sally suggested once she found that she had stopped screaming as well. The giant wolf-dog-ghost seemed to be gaining, which was understandable given the long legs it had. "Turn!"

"But then we'd go away from Halloween Town!"

"Just turn!" And so the trio turned. The wolf-dog-thing slowed down as it had to suddenly skid to a stop, bringing down many more trees, and continued loping after them.

"I think it's only angry at you, Oogie," Jack shouted over the tumbling of trees. "You are the one who kicked its tombstone, after all."

"It's not even supposed to have a tombstone!" The Boogeyman wailed. "It's a dog! Dogs don't have tombstones here!"

"Turn!" The trio turned towards Halloween Town once again, but the giant ghost seemed to be expecting this because it just simply kept gaining, and because Sally, with her short legs, was at the back, she was caught by a swinging paw and crashed into the nearest tree that hadn't been crushed yet. The wolf-thing caught her with its jaws the next time and proceeded to gnaw on her to bits, which is what dogs generally do to many belongings including shoes and dolls.

"Sally!" Jack skidded to a stop and grabbed Oogie, who had kept on running (and continued running in place when Jack grabbed him). "Oogie, we have to help her!"

"It's a ghost! It isn't thupposed to harm anybody! Only go through you and give you chills! She'll be fine!" He seemed to be trying to convince himself but failing miserably.

"But she's being torn apart! I can see her in its…"

"An illusion!" Oogie was still failing to convince himself, apparently, for he looked worriedly up.

An arm finally flew off and landed on Oogie's head. Jack gave him a Look. "What do you expect to do against that huge thing! Let's get away as fast as we can!" The Look was still boring through his head. "…To get help, of course!"

"But she needs help now!" Finally exasperated, Jack let go of Oogie and ran towards the white beast. Thick fog was now flowing around it now, going up to Jack's chest. Although he wasn't even as tall as its leg, the skeleton pounced on the ghost-dog-wolf in an attempt to save Sally, who had given up on screaming by then. Jack failed to remember that ghosts are known for going through solid objects and just because it was holding Sally up, didn't mean that he could grab onto it. Jack just went through the wolf-dog-thing…

…and during his trajectory through the ghost, felt dread and fear and depression all at once. He mostly felt cold though. Very, very cold. And his old childhood fear was coming back, and though he couldn't fear death, he could fear eventual fate as a pile of dust. He could also fear the possibility that he'd actually be conscious of being just a pile of dust, aware of his surroundings but unable to do anything whatsoever…time would pass by and he would stay in the same place…

And then Jack fell out of the ghost and landed very hard on his face. All the despair and feeling of hopelessness and all that bad stuff went away immediately, which most people would think was a good thing, but it really isn't because when somebody makes a transition from utter depression to just a normal feeling or maybe even pure happiness that they managed to get out of the depression in the first place, it must be gradual or else that person may experience something like a rubber band. Say you stretch one as far as a rubber band will go without snapping and suddenly let go. Then you would drop it and maybe suck on your fingers in pain. On the other hand, if you just pull it slightly and let go, the band will just bounce harmlessly off of your fingers (If you stretched it far out first, though, your fingers might still smart). Because Jack went from one extreme to another, he was now temporarily insane. Like a drunk. A really bad drunk.

As in, Jack was now laughing giddily at any thought that came to mind. As in, he started giggling at how Sally was strewn about in pieces because of the giant ghost thing ripping her apart. As in, he noticed how there was a flower nearby his head that, to him, seemed to look like a horse and he called it Charlie just because he felt like it. Also, he laughed.

The wolf-dog-ghost, now seemingly bored with just tearing Sally apart, dropped the almost lifeless-looking doll onto the ground, where most of her appendages fell out of their seams and bounced away somewhere in the foliage of the forest. The ghost descended upon Jack and the skeleton suddenly remembered in his pink drunken and insane clouded skull that dogs do like bones.

The massive ghost managed to also tear Jack to individual bone pieces and settled for gently gnawing on a femur. The unhappy, rather sober, Jack head rolled away from the rest of his body and couldn't do anything but watch in the direction his head happened to stop rolling in, which happened to be an upside-down and facing away from where all the action was happening.

Oogie, though originally was just planning on running away like he had been, stopped. He was feeling that strange foreign feeling again. The feeling he felt when he accidentally made Sally cry back in chapter two. Oh yeah, it was called guilt. Oogie found that he couldn't just leave two dismembered almost-friends alone in the woods. Actually, they wouldn't be alone. They would be with that gigantic wolf-ghost thing. Which, even if you looked at it in many different ways, was much worse than being alone.

While the dog-wolf-ghost was occupied by Jack's femur, Oogie hurried over to where Sally's head was. It was surrounded by dead leaves. "Quick," he hissed as he picked up the head. "Do you know a way to stop that thing?"

"If I did, I would have done it a while ago," the head replied, keeping remarkably calm despite the circumstances. It wasn't sarcasm, not exactly. Only Sally being honest. "I don't know anything about expelling ghosts or exorcism or anything. There was one thing I read about sealing ghosts, but we don't have anything to seal it to."

"Let's just go with that and see what happens," Oogie said quickly, looking over his shoulder at the wolf-dog-thing to check to see if it developed a sudden interest in bug-filled beanie babies.

"You'll need to…um…" The head frowned in concentration, and a little ways away, a finger tapped the ground. "Get a wand or something to point at the ghost with and…I think there's a silly dance involved…"

And so Oogie found himself with a stick in his hand (technically a wand, though he only picked it up from the ground), spinning around in an unenthusiastic silly dance (more shuffling really. He really wasn't putting much heart into the dance).

"Chant it now," hissed Sally's head.

"Uwagoblagohersyherring…" Oogie droned listlessly, almost wishing he had just simply run away. He spun the dirty sick around as he chanted, stopped spinning, and after ending with "largingohbuggerthis" he pointed the knobby stick not-so-firmly at the ghost-wolf-dog-thing. There was no spark or anything, for it was only a stick picked off from the ground, after all.

A whole bunch of nothing happened.

"You didn't do it right!" Sally's head hissed up from her resting spot.

"That was a really stupid dance with an even stupider chant. I didn't want to continue it." By now, the ghost seemed to have noticed that some action was going on while it was chewing on the hapless (and still sober and sane) Jack's femur and turned its attention towards Oogie.

"You have to do it again! You only half did it!"

"I don't think it's going to give me enough time to…" Oogie prepared to follow his instinct and run again, but the ghost seemed to inexplicably be reverting back into the smaller dog form as it ran towards him. Finally, it stopped running, mostly because it didn't have any legs anymore, but kept moving forward partially from the ghost's power to fly, partially from sheer momentum. Oogie was still tackled by a snarling white canine ghost, but at least it was a smaller snarling white canine ghost than before. He could feel the sack ripping, but it seemed that the dog was adapt at keeping the bugs in.

"…What just happened?" Oogie didn't bother trying to shake the much-less scary-looking ghost off his leg. It wasn't that it didn't hurt, because it hurt a _lot_. It was just that he felt that shaking a determined ghost off your leg was probably impossible.

"Um," Sally's head replied. "I'm not exactly sure…Daddy might know…" Oogie realized he now had a lot of bones and body parts to pick up off the damp forest ground.

He just simply picked up Sally's head again and said slowly, above the growling near his leg, "Where's that wheelbarrow?"

* * *

END CHAPTER THREE. Ha.

First of all, I really like temporarily insane and slightly drunk Jack. I really do. And his pink cloud of insanity and so on. Ha.

Anyways, I bet you all caught the reference to All Dogs Go To Heaven, mostly because I used the damn title in all those references to that movie that I barely remember and those who didn't catch those references either never watched or heard of the movie or are just plain stupid.

I think I made a reference to something else, but I forgot. Eh. Maybe someone will tell me soon.

And yes, this is the official introduction of Zero, the lovable ghost dog of Jack that apparently, in my book, was some homicidal weredog maniac killing thing before being tamed. I'm so weird.

Please reviieewww, it makes me feel warm and fuzzy inside and might give me temporary insanity.

* * *


	4. In Which All Are Assembled

Now Chapter four is oouuut. Hurray. I'm not very satisfied though, especially with the ending. Oh well. You'll just have to live with my sucky writing skills.

And of course, I don't own The Nightmare Before Christmas.

So if you try to sue, I'll sic Monster Zero on you.

Also, you may notice that I finally killed Oogie's stupid lisp. You know, I keep on mistakingly calling lisp a 'lips'. It's sort of funny.

Anyways, about Oogie's missing lisp: I will explain it in the next chapter! Woooo!

* * *

_In Which All Are Assembled and Jack Decides to Keep The Beast_

"Crap. It started raining."

"Please don't make us fall…"

"There's a lot of mud, okay? Aargh, this sack feels weird."

"Hehehehe."

"Shut up, Jack."

It was an interesting sight. The Boogeyman wheeling along a cart full of bones and body parts with a ghostly dog on his leg. Because not all of them could fit inside, he was carrying some bones. (The body parts didn't want him to carry them.) Another thing that was interesting was how the skull kept laughing every once in a while, as if enjoying a joke only he knew. (Jack had once again experienced temporary insanity after recovering from the dread of being chewed to bits only to feel a little too relieved when the ghost-dog let him go.)

And this was the sight that met Dr. Finkelstein's eyes when he opened his cold, metal door.

His first reaction was to spit out, "Oh, _you_," mostly because the sight of Oogie wasn't one that he really liked, even when soaking wet. His second reaction was to peer at what The Boogeyman was holding with one arm and say a little doubtfully, "Jack?" Jack's Skull giggled to himself in response. The doctor's final reaction was to look into what Oogie had been pushing in the rain. He recognized the head on top of the pile of assorted body parts and shouted, "Sally!"

"Let me in already," Oogie grumbled and sloshed his way pass the old scientist. It was then Finkelstein noticed a low growling noise near the floor and saw a dog-shaped thing gnawing on The Boogeyman's leg.

"What happened?!" Dr. Finkelstein demanded, rolling after the dripping sack. He then proceeded to go through the usual ritual of asking too many questions at one time. "Why is Sally in pieces? Why is Jack laughing like an idiot? What is that dog doing on your leg? What is a dog doing _here_?" Finally, there was a pause and Finkelstein narrowed his small beady eyes, though nobody could see that through his dark glasses. "…What did you do?"

"Why does everybody just assume it's my fault!" Oogie yelled to nobody in particular. "Okay, so this time, it might've been my fault, sort of, partly, but y'don't have t' immediately think it's me!" He almost kicked the wheelbarrow over in anger, but remembered that Sally and parts of Jack were in it. He took a few deep breaths that had a wet sound to them and turned back to Finkelstein. The tower was dark, but he could still see the wheelchair-bound figure because the door was still open. "I'll go ahead and explain stuff later. Just…I dunno, close the door. It's cold. And…do something 'bout Sally and Jack." The doctor realized he would have to be satisfied with this answer for now and nodded before rolling jerkily over to the elevator. Wet squelches and a squeaking wheel and growling told him that Oogie was following close behind.

"Lab," the doctor said into the not-so-golden funnel.

"Yes sir," the gravelly voice replied and the elevator shuddered upwards. Igor was there to meet them when the door opened. The hunched man seemed to have caught Finkelstein by surprise because the doctor flinched and made a noise usually associated with being surprised.

"Ah. Igor," he nodded to the short, rather dimwitted man. Dr. Finkelstein had managed to partly housetrain the man, but had not been able to actually get him to talk. Igor would lumber around silently and creep up behind him until he turned around. It was unnerving, actually. At least he could follow orders though. "…Get the table ready. You, wheel that up next to it." Finkelstein took a peek inside the wheelbarrow again as Oogie passed and realized he had a long night ahead of him. "Igor, light the lanterns when you're done."

As Dr. Finkelstein worked on Sally under the flickering lanterns, he listened to Oogie's story. Jack's Skull had stopped laughing at this point and seemed partly sane as he added random words to the story that almost had something to do with it. Sally had to often add or correct parts of the story and had to tell the whole ending because Oogie dramatized his parts and generally lied. The scientist often glanced at the ghost dog still gnawing on Oogie's leg, but when they got to the part where it ripped Sally apart, he resorted to outright glaring.

Dr. Finkelstein tried to explain the parts they didn't understand, like Jack's temporary insanity (during this explanation, Jack's Skull said both 'rubber band' and 'pineapple'), why the dog-ghost was here ("Since it's technically a werewolf, instead of going to heaven, it came here" or something along those lines) and why the wolf-dog-ghost-thing shrank. "Hmmm, a ghost sealing charm, eh?" the scientist said as he was finishing up Sally. "Half finished? Well, I do have a theory…"

"Wozzle," said Jack's Skull cheerfully. Everybody ignored this.

"This is a sealing charm after all, it's meant to seal a ghost to an object, usually. Even though you half finished it, it was trying to do what it is supposed to, mainly sealing ghosts. At least half seal it, anyways. Of course, you never indicated what to seal this ghost to. Maybe the charm just simply sealed it to the closest thing it found." Sally seemed to have understood, but Oogie didn't. Dr. Finkelstein caught the bewildered stare and impatiently added, "The ghost has two forms and the charm sealed the big form into the small form."

"Ah." Of course, Oogie still didn't get it, but he knew enough to know that the horrifying big wolf-ghost-thing wouldn't suddenly pop up anymore. Speaking of which…

Sally was now in a sitting position, experimentally swinging around her arms and bending knees. Satisfied with the new stitches, she brushed away her brown bangs and smiled a stitch-y grin. "Thanks, daddy. I think I'm as good as new now."

"Yeah, yeah, that's fine. Now help me get this thing off." Oogie wouldn't have said it out loud, but he hadn't tried getting the dog off partly because he was afraid it would suddenly transform back into that terrifying wolf thing and devour him whole or something. The thought of being scared of something really pissed him off though, because he was The Boogeyman and it was his job to scare, not be scared. So he didn't mention it.

"Oh, it's still on," commented Sally and she jumped off of the table so Finkelstein could work on reassembling Jack next. She bent down and attempted to grab onto the ghost dog, but her hands simply passed through. "Um," she said.

"Just grab it by the jaws, Sally," said the doctor from his perch as he puzzled over the jumble of bones. "Hm…Igor, get me a book about bones!" Sally was very reluctant to put her hands anywhere near those jaws, although the teeth didn't look so sharp now, but did so anyways and found that now she could tug the ghost off. The ghost seemed very reluctant to let go of Oogie though (the correct words are actually 'determined not to') and it took a lot of coaxing to get it off. The coaxing mostly included a lot of tugging and at one point, a very dangerous-looking implement that looks like a giant pair of tweezers. Sort of.

"Crap," Oogie moaned and covered up the rip because now the dog was off and the bugs were pouring out.

"Hang on, I'll sew that uwaaak!" The ghost, no longer needing its jaws to be solid to bite anything, easily slipped out of (or rather, through) Sally's grasp and floated away into a random cabinet. It sat there and made its presence generally known by growling. It wasn't an especially loud kind of growl, but it still grabbed attentions and held them down, kicking and screaming. The attentions, that is. Oogie and Sally watched where they thought it was hiding cautiously, as they both felt that if they turned their heads for one second, it would surely come down behind them and attack. Best to keep an eye on it.

Dr. Finkelstein snapped his head upwards when he heard Sally yelp and quickly rolled to where the two were. The doctor sneered up at the ghost (at least, where he believed it was) and said, "Ha, you want to stay up there?" He took out a piece of chalk and muttered something darkly under his breath, apparently still very indignant of the way the ghost had treated his dear Sally. "Igor, draw a circle around that cabinet, will you? Make sure there are no breaks in the line. Make the circle…mmm…four feet in diameter, maybe, give or take a few. And make sure that mutt's still in the cabinet when you're done."

"Ptttttbh," Igor spat in reply, though not in contempt. If he really felt he needed to communicate, two 'ptttbh's meant no and one meant yes. (He was working on a code for more complicated replies while he figured out how to talk, like maybe tapping out Morse code.) The squat man grabbed a stepladder, took the chalk, and started drawing the circle. It didn't really take very long, and soon Igor was opening the cabinet, something that could almost be considered a suicidal act or an act of wild abandonment or maybe one of temporary insanity. "Is it still in there?" asked Dr. Finkelstein. Igor could not give a 'ptttbh' in response because his face was being covered in rabid (ghost) dog, so he simply gave a thumbs-up.

"Hah," Finkelstein laughed in a rather satisfied way and started to wheel off. Nobody really knew what he was satisfied about as he only drew a circle around a cabinet and several occupants in the room, not including the (for the time being) mentally ill and men with faces possibly about to be chewed off, wondered if the doctor became temporarily insane.

"I've vandalized lots of stuff before…" Oogie started, speaking in the way usually reserved for people who cannot wrap their minds around a certain idea.

"I know, you've done it on my wall once," Finkelstein scornfully interrupted.

"But I've never seen somebody vandalize their own wall," The Boogeyman finished, apparently not aware that he had been rudely interrupted.

"It's a sealing circle! Do you really think I would do that without a good reason?! It usually is supposed to be drawn around several people to protect them from evil spirits – " and here several heads turned towards the dog-ghost " – and monsters – " the heads' stares intensified " – and such. An invisible barrier. I figured it could work the other way around. Normally as a scientist, I wouldn't believe in all that occult stuff, but it's hard to do when you live next to witches…" Sally and Oogie continued staring at the ghost-dog, which Igor seemed to be attempting to claw off while cautiously descending the stepladder while Finkelstein droned on. As they watched, Igor crossed the supposed hidden barrier and was swung around when the dog on his face suddenly stopped at the invisible wall. The dog let go at the sudden force that met him and was thrown back into the cabinet with a yelp. Igor crashed into whatever was behind him, which happened to be Oogie. They both fell with a thump on the cold stone floor. "…and I'd say that thing is now trapped in a small sphere with a diameter of four feet," Finkelstein finished smugly, either unaware or ignoring the two tangled bodies on the floor and the curses and frantic 'pttttbh's that erupted from them because of the bugs falling out from one's rip again and desperate attempts to get back up off of one's hunched back respectively.

"Now back to business. Stop fooling around back there." Dr. Finkelstein continued to ignore curses (that were now directed towards him) as he wheeled back to the various pieces of Jack. Sally helped Igor back up, politely asked Oogie to stop cursing so violently, and started sewing up the new rip.

"Millennium...hand and…shrimp…?" Jack's Skull said, but at least looked confused while doing so. Saying things randomly and wondering why you were saying them was a very big improvement from just saying things randomly.

"Yes, yes," Dr. Finkelstein just replied, recognizing the signs of temporary insanity wearing off, and continued puzzling over ways to put Jack back together. "…putting ligaments back together…well…lightning wouldn't help here…only helps in animating things…"

* * *

Jack's Skull shook off the pink, and oddly fuzzy, cloud of insanity (it was shaped like an elephant) and found that he was on a rather cold table.

Actually, he was partly on a rather cold table. Jack's Skull could see that he currently wasn't attached to anything, though his bones were being laid out in order, and that his legs weren't there yet as well as his left arm.

He had been aware of the time between his bouts of insanity and was rather embarrassed about it, but there were several other things to be embarrassed about now, such as…

"Where are my clothes?" the skeleton mumbled to Finkelstein, who was above him, staring at what was possibly an arm bone, or maybe a leg bone.

"All ripped. Especially the leg where it chewed on. It's amazing your femur didn't break." Jack's Skull beamed faintly, taking that as praise (Maybe the milk-bathing thing actually worked for him!) but quickly went back to being embarrassed. Finkelstein noticed the look on Jack's Skull. "There's nothing to be embarrassed about! You don't have anything to show! Besides, it's only us men here. Sally went up to her room to fix your suit."

"Oh. I guess that's comforting…"

"It's very hard putting ligaments back together, by the way. I'm not sure if I can repair those, so I will have to find another way to connect your bones again."

"Oh. Okay."

"I was thinking of glue."

"Hey!"

"That was a joke." Finkelstein would have added more about how he was a scientist and did they really think he'd resort to such primitive ways and so on, but he didn't seem up to it, so Jack's Skull merely replied, "Oh" and left it at that.

"You know, usually you could just stick my bones back together. It works with my head and neck, anyways."

"Yes, and that's still possible, but only because the upper area was the least damaged part. Much of your ligaments were chewed off otherwise, most down near your legs, and I'll have to find a way to reattach them. And I already thought of two ideas, but I need your permission to actually execute the action." Jack's head tried to nod slowly, but it was hard to when you're only a head. He started to get a feeling of dread in his stomach, which was strange because he didn't have any. Why would Finkelstein need his permission unless it was really dangerous…?

"Now, I've thought of either carving your bones, almost like…hm…hinges? Maybe. Anyways, it will make it easier to reattach your bones. It will also make it easier to disassemble them, actually, but no plan is perfect, eh?" Finkelstein tried to laugh, but found it hard to this time around.

Jack's Skull frowned and said, "That sounds painful. What's the other way?"

"A cream that can act in place of ligaments," the doctor replied a little too casually. He didn't add 'that may spontaneously combust after a few years of friction have been applied to it.' He felt that it was an unneeded detail to add. It was a very important detail, of course, but just because a detail is important, doesn't mean you have to say it. Like gravity, for instance. It's very important to have gravity, but you don't see people going around with shocked looks on their faces saying, "Holy crap, we're actually staying on the ground! We have gravity!" or something like that.

The simple description of the cream would have been suspicious to anybody that wasn't Jack's Skull. So Jack's Skull, being Jack's Skull, suspected nothing. "That sounds much nicer."

"So I have your permission?"

"Yeah, sure."

"And if you spontaneously combust, you won't come running back to me?"

"Well, if I spontaneously combust, I wouldn't be able to run," laughed Jack's Skull lightheartedly, still suspecting nothing.

"Right then. I'll get to work. By the way, do you think this goes on your arm or leg?"

"Leg, I think."

"Thank you." Dr. Finkelstein grabbed a large tub of a suspiciously (not to Jack's Skull, of course) oddly-colored cream and set it beside him on a side table. The color of the cream looked pink when you watched it carefully, but looked green when you peered at it from the corner of your eye, and moved around sluggishly when you weren't looking at all. Dr. Finkelstein reattached Jack's Skull to Jack's Neck, which wasn't attached to Jack's Various Vertebrae, much to the annoyance of Dr. Finkelstein, and decided to start fixing up Jack's Spine merely to get it out of the way.

Hours passed. Usually, these situations called for the scientist to shout with maniac glee right at midnight, when his new creation was done, but at midnight, Dr. Finkelstein was still working out the various parts of Jack's Arm. Oogie, out of sheer boredom, wandered up to the table to sneer at Jack (or more accurately, Jack's Skull and Spine and Ribs and Various Other Bones). Jack's SSRVOB was also getting quite restless, as you could only lie on a cold metal table for so long, but refrained himself from shifting so that the doctor wouldn't accidentally attach say, a toe to a thigh.

"Oh by the way, I took one of your ribs," he said, throwing the said bone carelessly onto the table, where it bounced once. It looked slightly gnawed. "We had to give that thing something to chew on 'cause it wouldn't stop growling and trying to jump on us when we passed. I think it really likes it."

"'It?' Oh, right, the ghost," replied Jack's Skull and Spine and Ribs Minus One and Various Other Bones, and he then tried to look around while making as little movement as possible and stared at the cabinet where the ghost-dog was lurking.

"I knew something was missing!" Dr. Finkelstein snatched the rib and began the delicate process of setting the weird cream onto Jack's Missing Rib. He dunked it in the tub like one would do with chips and salsa and stuck it in its place among its fellow bones.

"I took it away again, 'cause you're getting reassembled and all. It took a bunch of fast reflexes too." Oogie's fast reflexes were as fast as a snail, which was why Jack's SSRVOB saw a small bit of sack hanging out of the ghost's jaws and some bugs scuttling away very quickly. Oogie excused himself to go up to Sally again and stumbled to the elevator, trying not to trail bugs.

So it was actually two forty-one in the morning when Dr. Finkelstein finally lay down the jar (where the cream shifted uncomfortably when it wasn't watched) and cried out with maniacal laughter, or at least relived laughter that he wouldn't have to fit anymore bones together for hopefully a long time. Those irritatingly small wrist bones were a pain to fit together.

Jack (with every bone connected now and hopefully not going to spontaneously combust anytime soon) sat up and flexed his hands experimentally. "Wow, doctor! Good as new! You really are a genius!"

"Yeah, well don't come back in pieces anytime soon…" Finkelstein grumbled, waving away praise for once. He rolled grumpily away, eager for a well-earned rest.

"Wait, I still need my clothes," said Jack, just as the elevator opened and both Oogie and Sally walked out. Jack's newly sown suit was hanging around Sally's arms, and she had the forethought to be looking towards the stairs rather than at Jack's naked body. Sure, he was only bones and there shouldn't be anything wrong with that, but it's the thought that counts, right? Sally was thinking very embarrassed thoughts, Jack was thinking that he was very embarrassed indeed, and Oogie was thinking that the whole thing was stupid because Jack clearly had nothing to hide. So he snatched the suit and threw it over at the skeleton so the whole ordeal could be over with already.

The first thing Jack did was to thank Sally repeatedly for her hard work as well as asked repeatedly to relay several thanks to Dr. Finkelstein as well. The second thing he did, when told by Oogie to 'shut up already' was to go up and examine the ghost-dog. At a safe distance, of course. Right outside where the barrier was supposed to be.

"Hm," he mused, bending down so that his skull was level with the floating, grumpy dog. "What's a good name for a dog?"

"'Homicidal Maniac,'" Oogie replied immediately, still bearing ill thoughts of the ghost dog.

"That doesn't sound like a good name," Jack said doubtfully. His eye sockets bore into the dog intensely now, as if he could find an answer just by staring at it. The dog, for once, was a little creeped out and it backed away.

"Well, why d'ya wanna name it anyways?" Oogie asked crossly.

"Pets generally have names, don't they?"

It took a few seconds for the meaning of Jack's amiable comment to sink in. After that, both Oogie and Sally started to shout out various things such as 'You're going to _keep _it?! As a _pet?!_' and 'I honestly think that's not a good idea!' and '_Keep_ it?!' and 'It tore me to pieces, and it knocked you into pieces too, Jack!' and 'It's a monster!' and 'It'll kill you in yer sleep, you know that, right?' and 'I don't think it can be tamed at all' and 'Alright then, nice knowing ya man.'

"Well," Jack continued calmly once all the outbursts ceased, "I figured that this poor dog must have been all alone all this time. Also, he can't do a lot of harm now, can he? If I can tame him, then it'll be fine."

"'Him'?" Sally finally managed to say faintly, recognizing this very situation. Like he did for Oogie, Jack was starting to feel sorry for the dog, though she couldn't imagine how.

"'Poor'?!" Oogie thundered.

"Look," Jack raised a skeletal hand in a calming fashion. "I'm sure he can be trained not to brutally mutilate people. He just needs to learn…uh, social skills."

"Dogs don't do that, Jack."

"Then the dog equivalent of social skills."

"I think they just sniff each other's butts and pee on stuff," grumbled Oogie sullenly. "I think it just wants to be left alone. Let's just let it go and forget about it."

"With time I can teach it not to bite anybody," said Jack firmly, apparently ignoring Oogie. Then, against all advice and common sense, Jack held out his hand to the ghost dog and commanded, "Sit."

Then he said, "Oh wait, I guess you can't…" So the skeleton instead commanded, "Lie down." The dog, even if he could, would never want to sit just because somebody told him to because there was absolutely no reason to. What was the use of sitting? And what was the use of lying down if he wasn't even tired? So, the dog floated there and glowered back, showing no signs of doing anything. Not even, surprisingly, biting. "Lie down," Jack repeated, although in a slightly different commanding tone, as if switching tones would make the dog lie down. And that's when the dog decided to bite Jack's outstretched hand.

"Bad dog," Jack said, trying not to howl with pain. His eyes might have watered, but he didn't have any. He carefully used his other hand to prod the dog carefully in an attempt to gently push it off. "Bad dog."

This was just sad. "Jack," Sally started, unable to just continue watching this poor excuse of training silently. "I know you really like helping out everybody, and I know you really think this dog is in desperate need of help…but…well, I don't think the dog thinks it's in desperate need of anything. Though…I guess it would probably like it if we could un-half-seal it…" Jack's pushing seemed to have no affect on the dog, for now it seemed to somehow engulf his whole hand. He pushed harder.

"It's like a one-sided effort," Oogie joined in. "All of the effort's comin' from you, and zero from that dog. Like I said, let's just leave it alone. All we have to do is not bother it."

"Wait!" Jack suddenly spun around, knocking the dog into the barrier in the process (who let go of the hand yelping in pain and started to sulk near the cabinet again) and grabbed Oogie by the shoulders, or at least where his shoulders would be. He could feel the bugs move around under the sack, and it was a weird and very disquieting feeling, but he ignored that for the time being. "What did you just say?"

"Uh," Oogie stuttered at first, completely taken off guard. He tried to think of what he had said before. It took a few seconds mostly because he didn't expect to be quizzed on what he said. "'All we have to do is not bother it'?"

"Back farther."

"'Like I said, let's just leave it alone?'"

" Farther."

"'It's like a one-sided – '"

"Next sentence, near the end."

"Um," Oogie frowned with concentration again. "'And zero from that dog?'"

"Yes! You're absolutely right!"

"What?" Oogie replied, grinning uncertainly. He had never been told he was right before, mostly because everybody was too busy telling him that he was a bully and would kill somebody someday with all those risky stuff he kept doing. It actually felt good, even when it came from that idiot Jack.

"Zero is a great name for a dog!"

The smile disappeared. "'Ere, that's not what I meant -" but Jack had already turned back to the ghost dog.

"Your name is Zero, then." Jack pointed to the newly-christened Zero, but withdrew his hand hurriedly in fear of being bitten again. "When do you think Dr. Finkelstein is going to let him out?"

"Probably never, if he can."

"Then…" Jack frowned up at the cabinet. "How will he get the stuff in there…?" Sally just shrugged. "Hm. Well, I don't want him to just stay there…it feels wrong."

"Not to me," said Oogie.

"He'd just lay there on the cold floor…"

"Let him lay there."

"Nothing to eat…"

"I don't care as long as it doesn't eat me."

"Nothing to play with…"

"Trust me, Jack, it ain't a good idea to get involved with that thing."

"Hm. Do you just destroy the chalk circle to let him out?"

"Please don't let it out."

"It might run away if you let it out."

"Oh, that's bad."

"Why did you only ignore me?!"

The newly-named Zero watched the moving sack storm around angrily in mild bemusement. The three were weird, no doubt about that. Still sticking around even after he bit and chewed as hard as he could. The walking bone thing seemed to take a big interest in him, which was probably good, because then it would be much easier to chew on a bone if the source was close by.

Zero, of course, would never even think that Jack was considering keeping him as a pet. In fact, if the thought ever arose to his doggy brain, he would laugh. Or whatever the dog equivalent of laughing is. Zero should be the one owning, not the one being owned, at least in his opinion. It was also his opinion that, out of the occupants in the room currently, he was on the top, and the three kids in front of him at the bottom. There was also that hunched spitting man lumbering around behind them and cleaning up, and he was at the way bottom (so bottom that he would be deep underground, maybe around the Earth's core).

It was a complete coincidence that during the time Jack was thinking of owning and training him, Zero was thinking of sticking around Jack mostly for the convenience of there being a bone dispenser right nearby.

"Well, for now, I guess we should leave some food and bedding for him. Can you guys help me?" Sally and Oogie glanced at each other in that 'why did we even bother trying' way and surrendered. Zero was surprised to find that a few minutes later, a soft hand-made blanket was tossed at him (Oogie wanted to give him several pieces of old newspaper, or maybe ripped pages from the doctor's several scientific books) and a filled bowl of miscellaneous items cautiously pushed into the barrier. He stared at the bowl. It seemed that it had been filled by many people who had argued about what it was exactly a dog liked to eat and so each person put in whatever they thought should be put in. There seemed to be ground beef in one end and sausages in the other and a strange mix of milk and fish. (Oogie did that too, only to spite Zero.) Zero, as a ghost, wondered if they knew he really didn't need any of these things.

Of course, he wasn't complaining, though it would be nice if the bowl wasn't filled with a horrendous mix of various meats and milk. Zero made sure to completely ignore the bowl and floated down gently into the blanket and made himself as comfortable as a ghost can get. The three left, and he spent the last few hours of wakefulness staring carefully at the weird jar of cream that was left on a table that seemed to be different colors if he looked at it in different angles and seemed to move when he wasn't looking. Then he slept. Or whatever it is ghosts do for sleep.

* * *

There. And that's how Zero became Jack's pet. Or maybe the other way around, considering which perspective you view from.

I think I make Jack an idiot too many times. Oh well. Maybe that's the thing that makes him well-liked? But if I try to do the same thing, then I start failing school and then people get angry at me.

I really don't have a lot to say.

So, please review. And stuff. Yes, even if you've reviewed a previous chapter. Just tell me what you like or dislike about this and what I should've done and so on and so forth.


	5. Oogie's Stew and Deadly Nightshade

Okay, I finally finished. I really only have a vague idea what will happen next. I also believe that these vague ideas will develop into horrible chapters with glaringly obvious plot holes.

I don't even have these vague ideas in chronological order yet...

But I'll worry about that later. And without further ado, I bring you the long-awaited-chapter-that-only-a-couple-of-people-have-been-waiting-for...

Drum roll here.

* * *

_Snake and Spider Stew and Deadly Nightshade_

Maybe he was overreacting, the Mayor reflected as he scuttled around the drab and dreary background of Halloween Town. Maybe there was a simple explanation for this. Maybe, maybe maybe maybe….they forgot…?

But who would forget!? This was a very important event! That didn't explain anything at all! (In fact, it introduced more questions, to the Mayor's dismay.)

The Mayor scuttled quickly up the tall stairs and knocked on the door hurriedly. Only a few seconds later, though it seemed like many long minutes, he pulled the rope for the doorbell.

The Mayor was feeling very stressed indeed, for he had jumped when the doorbell did its job and screamed. It was a very good scream, high-pitched and frightened. The Mayor had been meaning to get the very same track for his own doorbell, but always kept forgetting about it, seeing that he had Mayor-ly things to do, like plan the whole Halloween. Also, he realized after many years that it got old and pretty much boring.

After he managed to regain his balance which is very hard for a conical-shaped man to do, he reached up to straighten his large top hat, only to find that it had fallen off and landed a few steps down before falling off the stairs entirely, almost out of sight. The Mayor was about to turn around and pick it up, but stared at the door warily in case Jack would answer the doorbell right when he would retrieve his hat. The door remained innocently shut. The Mayor still stared, trying to pick up any noises from behind the door that might indicate that an occupant was coming to open it. The door stared gloomily back, still closed. The Mayor finally went down the steps towards his hat, but slowly, and still looking back at the door with round and morose eyes, but he had to look away at some point, to bend down next to the stairs to get his hat.

It was at that point Jack opened the door, looked right and left quickly, then shut it again.

The Mayor's head popped back over the stairs, now with the ridiculously tall hat, and because it had been such a horribly distressing day, he cursed. Under his breath. Respectfully.

"Damn and blast," he said awkwardly, for he never had much practice in cursing. "Damn and blast," he repeated for good measure, just in case anybody was actually listening, before climbing back up the stairs again and knocking on the door once more. This time, Jack answered almost immediately.

"Oh, hello Mayor," Jack said in a rather polite, but very distracted, way. This only served to piss off the Mayor a little more for reasons he couldn't exactly explain himself. Maybe it was just because so far, the day had been pretty horrible. Much worse than ringing the doorbell, having to walk away for certain reasons, and the occupant opening and closing the door right when you're out of sight.

"Jack, don't you know what day it is?" The Mayor started, not even replying to the salutations. He tried to ignore the insistent barking that was in the background, but found it hard when the source of the loud barking came closer and closer and apparently started tugging on Jack's leg in a vicious attempt to steal another femur to chew on again. Still, he valiantly refused to look down towards what Halloween Town had come to think of as the Hell-Dog-Ghost (Also sometimes called 'AUUGH IT'S HERE GETITAWAYGETITAWAYGETITAWAY.' Many people couldn't bring themselves to call it Zero when 'Homicidal Maniac' seemed much better).

"Um," Jack frowned in concentration, because it's hard to remember what day it is when your leg is being attacked. The skeleton tried to push away the dog lightly, but that didn't work (it never worked) so he hit him. Lightly, though. With a rolled up newspaper. "Wednesday?" he finally answered.

"Yes, that's true, but what date?" The Mayor urged, trying not to suddenly throw a crying fit.

"Well…it's September…"

"Yes, the first Wednesday of September, remember?"

"I suppose so…"

"And there is something that happens on the first Tuesday of September, remember…?" The Mayor prompted even more, sounding even more desperate.

"Hm…"

"We made that event because Halloween would be very soon…?"

Jack's thoughtful and concentrated expression slowly grew into one of dismay, almost like the Mayor's current expression. "I'm really sorry…it just slipped my mind…a lot of things have been happening…I'm _really _sorry…"

"It's a very important rehearsal! You can't just _forget _it! We waited for you for a long time and we finally sent someone to get you but you weren't home! Where _were _you?!" The Mayor started uncontrollably blubbering, unable to hold in his full feelings any longer. Jack stuttered something about 'tree-houses' and 'Zero' back.

When Oogie Boogie came by, they were still at it, Jack apologizing many times over and making several promises while the Mayor started confessing his worries and stress at the same time. The volume of both grew gradually louder as they had to keep raising their voices to make sure the other heard what they were saying. Oogie found this all very stupid.

"Alright, what're y'all crying about?" he sighed, making his way up the steps. He found he couldn't maneuver around the Mayor, so he simply stopped behind the short man. Of course, the Mayor jumped once he turned around, because the thought of Oogie ever being behind you wasn't a very friendly one. Especially when he was smiling a little. (Oogie was smiling because two months before then, he had found out that after the whole 'dead-feral-were-thing' incident, he had magically lost his lisp. Nobody knew why, though. It is widely-known, however, that many can be scared out of their wits. Some suspect that Oogie was simply scared out of his lisp. This was probably a good thing, because it is much better to lose your lisp than your wits in such a dangerous situation. Oogie himself was very pleased that such a thing happened.)

"O-oh, hello, Oogie…" the Mayor greeted with obvious reluctance. True, Oogie hadn't actually done anything bad for a while. He hadn't tried blowing up something or tying up one of the vampires outside just minutes before daytime or pointed a powerful hair dryer at the Melting Man. Even so, the Mayor found himself very suspicious of the malevolent boy and still very much frightened. He didn't really want to talk to him, but he did ask what was going on…

The Mayor composed himself and tried to make himself taller. "Well, Jack here didn't show up yesterday, so as Mayor," here, he indicated his Mayor ribbon, "I felt it was my job to find out why." The man's pale face stared defiantly at Oogie's, though he was anything but threatening.

"Yesterday? Oh yeah, it's that rehearsal thing you guys do every year." Oogie never took part in the celebrations partly because he didn't think you were supposed to sing (he felt that celebrating Halloween was all about scaring the shit out of anybody you possibly can. Plus, he felt dancing and singing was pretty stupid (Okay, so he does dance and sing sometimes, but _shhh_…it's supposed to be a secret)) but mostly because all the other denizens agreed that he would just ruin the whole bloody thing anyways. Of course, whenever Oogie was in a particular mood, he would go and ruin it anyways. "You all do a bunch of other rehearsals, don't you? I'm sure Jack can catch up whenever. Don't get so uptight about that. You've all done fine up 'til now, right? And that's saying something since you've been doing it for, I dunno…several hundred years, give or take a few?"

"We do fine until you show up…" the Mayor mumbled gloomily before raising his voice again. "Halloween is only a month away! We can't just afford to slack off! As Mayor of Halloween Town, I can't let anybody slack off – "

"As Mayor of Halloween Town, blah, blah, blah," Oogie mocked. "Jeez, can't you take it easy? You have…what? Eight weeks? Which would be about…fifty-six days? That's plenty of time."

"…We have fifty-eight days, actually…"

"Ah, even more time. See? Nothing to worry about. I bet your Halloween party thing'll be just as good as last year's."

"Until you show up…"

"Yeah, whatever." Oogie slapped an arm around the Mayor's shoulder cordially and leered. "Now I'm sure you've got some other stuff to do now, hm? More important things…whatever it is you do." The Mayor suddenly found himself walking away from Jack's Tower, (it is a mystery how the Mayor and Oogie Boogie managed to maneuver around each other on the stairs without either of them falling off, but they managed) still dismayed, but knowing that even though Oogie hadn't done anything so far, provoking him might get him to hang the poor conical man from a tree again. Or something even worse.

It wasn't right that everybody just let Oogie go around doing those things without even a slap on the wrist. The Mayor knew this. However, he had always been too scared to even raise a finger. Everybody had. In fact, the Mayor was very certain that he had been hung on a tree because he had once tried doing so. (It's his duty as Mayor after all, to enforce the few laws they had and punish those who broke them.) Everybody had then stopped talking to him in fear that they might provoke him in some way. He still tried his risky tricks even if they didn't provoke him, but they always turned a blind eye. (Even the witches were afraid of him because they had learned through trial and error that though you can suppress him, The Boogeyman won't stay that way forever. He _will_ come back, possibly even stronger than before, seeking vengeance.)

"I really shouldn't have forgotten…it was very horrible of me," Jack moaned as Oogie pushed him back inside and successfully landed a kick on Zero, who decided he should leave the two alone for the time being.

"Yeah, yeah, it's all your fault, you should've gone, you're a terrible pers…skeleton, I get the idea." Oogie shoved Jack down a little roughly into a plush chair and took the chance to look around. He had never been in Jack's place before.

The tower was made out of stone, like Dr. Finkelstein's place, but it was filled with more…more…stuff (mostly taken up by bookshelves). It looked neat, like one would expect of Jack; there were cobwebs in corners, (though this usually isn't an example of neatness, the cobweb looked like it had actually been _trimmed_)and one you could almost walk into, and beyond that door over there was probably a kitchen or a dining room that would look dark and gloomy, yet oddly spotless. But it was completely crowded with books. It was obvious that his curiosity had to be constantly satiated by some new book. It was also obvious that the books couldn't fit in all the shelves, though Jack had apparently tried. (One shelf had a full row of books, as well as some small books shoved on top.) There was also a black spiral staircase curling upwards to a hole that Oogie suspected he couldn't possibly fit into. He guessed there were even more shelves up there, and also pondered the possibility of the house being a tower just so they could build more shelves to hold even more books.

"Looks like a library," The Boogeyman muttered to himself darkly. It wasn't that he had anything against books or reading, it was just that those things symbolized education, and education tends to make people stop believing in The Boogeyman. It really pissed him off, not being believed in (also, it hurt his feelings, though he wouldn't admit that). Also, they smelled funny. So, he held a mutual gruffness towards books.

"I really should practice now," Jack moaned from his large couch. There was a pile of books on one side of it that was neatly stacked, not even threatening to fall over. The top book was open.

"Yeah, whatever. It's almost lunch. I can make some good stew, if you want," Oogie called from the kitchen, already taking out a large pot (that managed to look shiny and rusted at the same time).

"I'm horrible…"

"Right then. It's Snake 'nd Spider Stew, by the way," The Boogeyman continued, filling the pot about half-way with dark, slightly murky-looking water.

"I'm the worst…"

"Where do you keep your snakes and spiders, anyways?" Oogie asked as he inspected one of the cabinets in the kitchen.

"You're made of snakes and spiders yourself, aren't you?" Jack retorted, lazily waving a long arm from his seat. "Can't you use those?"

Oogie stared at the skeleton from the doorway and slowly said, "You're sick, man," before continuing to investigate the kitchen cabinets, not even waiting for the apology Jack would surely give (you know, being so polite and all). "It may be my favorite food, (and the only thing I can make) but I wouldn't start eating myself 'cause of it. That'll be like some cannibal zombie eating himself."

"…But if you eat snake and spiders, doesn't that make you a cannibal?" Jack asked, no longer feeling depressed with his own inadequacy now that an interesting topic had been brought up.

Oogie would have made a witty retort, but unfortunately, could only think of "Shut up" before finding some spiders himself in the corners on their cobwebs and snatching a few snakes Jack happened to have on hand and tossing them in the large pot carelessly. After a few seconds, he decided to put a lid on the pot as well and turned the old (but still clean) stove on to the setting 'high'.

Oogie pushed his way out of the kitchen again. "Hey, what're you planning on doing today? You're not just gonna practice that stupid thing, are you?"

Jack's face fell again and he held his skull in his hands. "Oooh, I'm horrible…I'm the worst…I shouldn't have forgotten…" He repeated this chant for a while, making Oogie sigh loudly.

"You sound like you've just destroyed the town or something. Will you stop griping already? Geez. Anyways, I was wondering if ya wanna come wanderin' with me…around," he finished vaguely.

"Why?" Jack asked, and after a second thought, added, "Around where, exactly?"

"Oh, 's just that it always gets boring around here when everybody's busy making preparations for the stupid thing. They always scurry around mindlessly, preparing, worrying, practicing, worrying again, and then they start ripping their hair out, or something else if they don't have hair, and start screaming madly at even the smallest 'boo.' It's annoying and stupid." Oogie paused to find somewhere to sit, but decided to just lean against the wall. "It always happens and it's no use trying to find someone unstressed and stuff here. And I can't scare myself. So I go out for a bit and come back in time for Halloween."

"Well, Halloween is a very important day," Jack said, feeling he had to stand up for himself and everybody else that started to freak out just before Halloween.

"It's the _only_ important day."

"And we spend all year to prepare for it, so nobody wants it to be messed up or anything. Of course somebody would be stressed just days before Halloween. And it all pays off in the end, you know."

"Hm? Pays?"

"The fun, the feeling of accomplishment – "

"Oh_, those_."

" – exhilaration of a job well done, and the pumpkin pie afterwards isn't all that bad either," Jack finished.

"How d'you feel after the whole thing when unstressed fangirls come barreling t'wards ya?" Oogie sneered, though not in the mean way at all, since they were kinda sort of friends.

Jack swiftly changed the subject to, "Now around where, exactly?"

Oogie was silent for a moment, trying to think of a way to explain it. "Well, you know where the witches go for most of the night on Halloween? And how sometimes that devil guy gets summoned that day too?" Jack nodded slowly.

"They go to the place with people who go around in costumes everywhere and threaten other bigger people to give them candy or else and sometimes they dare each other to do stupid things like go around in scary houses or do a weird satanic-like ritual or something like that."

"Yeah, those guys. Though they aren't in costume all the time. And it isn't exactly 'threatening.' And they aren't satanic. And they eat the candy in the end."

"I knew that last part," Jack said, frowning slightly.

"Well, I couldn't tell. Anyways, I go there myself 'round this time when everybody's raving mad with stress."

"How? I mean…you can't fly on a broomstick. I think. And I think you don't get summoned either, though it would be fitting for a satanic ritual."

Oogie shot Jack a glare before answering, "Who d'you think you're talking to? I'm _The_ Boogeyman, remember? I pop out of kids' closets or sometimes under their beds or maybe through the windows. I can get anywhere."

"Wow."

"Also, I found two ways to get there. There's a door in a gravestone and through the back of the old Town Hall."

"Oh." Jack's awe of Oogie's 'powers' were immediately shot down, did a barrel roll towards the ground covered in flames, and exploded upon impact on the ground. He tried not to let it show. "Why do you go there anyways? I've heard the people over there are pretty easy to scare."

"Yeah, an' they're stupid too," Oogie added. "There are some that are harder to scare, 'cause they're not superstitious or whatever that is. I probably haven't even met them yet, either. But still, it's funny to see them go to the loony bin in the end."

"The what?"

"Insane asylum."

"Why would they go there?"

"'Cause everybody thinks the guy is stark raving mad when I'm done. The results are the same with the other kind of people, though sometimes it goes faster 'cause they're already scared of me. Even when I haven't met 'em." Of course, to make him sound more impressive, Oogie didn't mention that most of the ones who were already scared of him were children and they did not get sent to the loony bin, but were simply berated by parents and made fun of by others.

"How would they be afraid of you if they haven't even met you?" asked Jack dubiously.

"'Cause," Oogie started, with much more than a hint of pride, "I'm The Boogeyman.

"Now d'ya wanna come or not?"

Jack shrugged. It seemed interesting. "Sure." Then the soup was done and they ate (or drank or whatever), the thought of practicing once again forgotten.

Now let's pause a moment here to look deeper into Oogie Boogie, because he failed to mention one other reason why he always went to the "Real World." The second reason is this: it made him feel invincible.

Oogie Boogie, as we have been told several times, is The Boogieman; the very personification of that horrible thing lurking around everywhere; specifically, the personification of fear. So therefore, he loves evoking fear. In fact, he finds fear for one's life to be the most satisfying of all. It makes him feel good and refreshed, which is rather disturbing when he grins up at your terror-stricken face, obviously delighted with his work. Spreading fear is his meaning of life and not doing so for long periods of time is depressing for him.

So a being like Oogie, who literally thrives on fear, in a terror-laden world like ours would, of course, make him feel invincible. It might even induce him to spontaneously skip around cheerfully when he pass people who have just realized that there is a high probability that they may die by falling down the stairs or they can die from a coconut to the head or they have a terminal disease of some sort. (I advise you to stop thinking about Oogie Boogie skipping, as it may evoke a mental image that will scar you for the rest of your days. Your imagination, being the cruel thing it is, may even add a field of flowers. And people dying or about to be dead in the distance. And maybe a bow will be involved. But I'm not helping, am I?)

The only reason that he hadn't just gone and lived there and maybe think up a plot to take over the world in a terror-filled reign (and that didn't make sense, did it) was because he always looked forward to going back and he very well can't go back if he stayed. It was a treat that he eagerly awaited every year when the people of Halloween Town started to get boring and when he couldn't think of special ways to go around scaring them.

Now remember that he was not an ordinary citizen of Halloween Town. Unlike most of his age, he was created out of pure imagination to fill the spot of The Boogeyman and hide in closets and leer at little children and so on. Everybody else in Halloween Town was made entirely from curiosity, instead of fear.

Of course, this means that Jack's mission of Make Oogie Into An Upstanding Citizen was useless from the very beginning. No matter what he did, Oogie would continue to terrorize innocents. It's sad, but Oogie couldn't help the way he was 'born'.

Our ancestors are to blame for Oogie's creation, really, as the fear held by children everywhere as they quietly listened to scary tales of blood-sucking vampires and witches hungry for little children like them and wolves who could easily eat them whole and, of course, The Boogeyman who hid in shadows and waited quietly to drag you away to terrors unknown was the very thing that gave birth to Oogie Boogie. As years passed, these various stories were toned down; the woodcutter kills the wolf and saves the little girl and her granny in the end. Hansel never got eaten by the witch and instead, the witch herself was killed in her own oven. Goldilocks never was brutally murdered by the hands of three extremely pissed off bears (though that never happened anyways, actually). The only thing that remained lurking in dark corners was The Boogieman, so Oogie, being made out of fear, had to be the scariest thing there currently was, not something long ago or toned down over the years.

I think I'm beginning to repeat myself and this is probably starting to become boring, so I will go back to the story.

"So, she's grounded?" Jack asked, since Dr. Finkelstein still didn't like talking to Oogie much.

"Yes," snapped Finkelstein, who was about to get ready to slam the door.

"But why?" Jack persisted, quickly moving his foot in front of the large door. This was not a good idea, as the door would probably give him all kinds of pain, but it was enough to prevent Dr. Finkelstein from closing the door any further as the scientist uneasily remembered that Jack could still very well spontaneously explode from the unusual cream acting as his ligaments.

"Because," Finkelstein replied, his eyes darting quickly down to the shoe in the way of the door, "I'm doing this for her sake. It's a dangerous world, you know, and that whole business with…that Hell-Hound made me realize it. She's a young girl, and I don't want to let her go out if she can't handle it." The mad scientist ignored Oogie's loud scoff of 'Two months is too extreme'.

"Well, can we still see her, at least?" Jack politely asked. Dr. Finkelstein looked back down at the black shoe. It didn't look like it would move out of the way of the door anytime soon.

"Fine," the scientist conceded, and rolled out of the way. "Her room is on the top floor. She's probably reading right now." Jack thanked him while Oogie simply shoved past him and the two boys made their way to the top floor.

The door to Sally's room was a grimy sort of steel and had a very large bar and some kind of intricate mechanism to lower it. It was very concerning, but at least it was unlocked. Before Jack could knock, Oogie pulled the door open and walked towards a surprised Sally, who was sitting on her bed with a very thick book on her lap. It looked like the kind of book that had words like 'Hippopotomonstrosesquippedaliophobia' or 'Pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis' and would probably cut off all circulation in your legs if you left it on there too long. Luckily for Sally, she did not have blood.

"Okay, we're planning on going someplace and Jack suggested to get you to tag along and stuff," he explained bluntly.

"Oh?" Sally replied, a little surprised and very touched at the thought. Especially since it came from Jack and all. "But I'm grounded."

"Yeah, your dad told us and all…I just figured…you might want to know where we're going and all…" Jack said sheepishly, rubbing the back of his skull.

"Jack, shut up." The skeleton immediately did so, not out of obedience, more out of instinct before he could realize what he was doing. "'Ere, do you wanna come or not?" The Boogeyman asked Sally.

"Well, I don't even know where you're going…" Sally hesitated, though she did close her ludicrously thick book.

"Trust me, it'll be great," Oogie said, grinning madly. "It's better than just staying 'round this place anyways. Jeez, your room is bare…"

"Well, I guess I'd like to go…"

"Great. Then let's think of a plan to sneak you out."

"Huh?" Both Jack and Sally's minds reeled from the sudden turn the conversation veered to. "Can we do that?" asked Jack tentatively as he was very sure the fact that you were grounded meant you weren't allowed to go out.

"Well, why not?" Oogie shot back as he lumbered towards the large barred window and pushed it open with a loud creak. "Hey, do you think you can jump down from here?" He asked Sally as he peered down.

"It's a long way to the ground…and I'd surely fall apart…and it's awfully high up…"

"Well, you'll still be alright. You can sew yourself back up, right?" Oogie called back, insensitive as ever. Sally decided not to be overly dramatic and burst into tears like last time and settled for giving him The Look. The Look is something all husbands should very well know, as it is the stare that their wives give them when they've done something incredibly stupid or insensitive or just something morally wrong to them, which is just about all the time. "Bad idea?"

"Bad idea."

"Okay, then we can…" Oogie started pacing a little.

"It's okay, I don't have to go now, you can show me it later," Sally said softly.

"We can drug him then," Oogie finished, having apparently ignored Sally yet again.

The girl realized that the moment she agreed to go, she was going and that was that. There was no turning back. She sighed and said, "Drug him with what?"

Oogie shrugged. "Deadly Nightshade oughtta do it."

Silence met him.

Then, "You do know the reason why it's called _Deadly_ Nightshade?" asked Sally tersely.

Oogie looked at Sally in surprise, as if he didn't expect her to ask the question in the first place because the answer was so obvious. "Well, it's a poison that can kill," he said.

"And," Sally said patiently, making sure the fury in her voice was known, "you want to use it on my _father_?"

"Well, yeah," Oogie said uneasily, suddenly realizing his predicament. He glanced warily back at Jack, who had grown suspiciously silent, and found quite a lot of something that wasn't support at all back there too. "Here, look," he said, trying to explain his plan. "Most of us 'round here are dead anyways, like Jack. It's stupid to think that poison could kill him, right? And if your old man can walk around with his head open, and he managed to survive getting electrocuted by me, do you really think he'd die of poison?" He wisely decided not to mention that even if Finkelstein did die, there was a very high chance that he would just become a zombie and keep on living and that the only difference would be that he would be dead.

"That's a good point, except for one thing. I really don't want to risk my dad's life," Sally replied sternly.

"Then we'll reduce the effects or something. I dunno, make it so that the worst he'd get would be a horrible headache when he wakes up."

"You can do that?" Sally asked skeptically, to which Oogie simply nodded. "Well…if that's all...then I guess it's alright."

A few minutes and a poisoned soup later, Sally found herself following Jack, who was following Oogie. The Boogeyman was following nobody, obviously, since he was leading the way. He was also bragging a bit about since he was The Boogeyman, he could simply just appear in any child's closet or under their beds, if he wanted to, but since he was taking two other people along, he'd have to refrain from doing so this time. Jack and Sally politely went along with it.

They soon arrived at the graveyard. Sally glanced cautiously at the woods that lay beyond it, but they weren't going in that direction. Oogie turned towards a large gravestone. Or maybe it was a monument. It was hard to tell. The gravestone/monument had a very fearsome statue of a demon-like creature carved on it. Its mouth was bared in an ugly expression, as if it was about to pounce on somebody and eat their heart, or it just saw something very disgusting like very moldy bread.

This statue isn't very important. Below it was a set of stone double doors slanting slightly so that it looked as if it led to someplace underground. The doors each had round iron handles, linked to the stone with large iron chains. Oogie went ahead and pulled open the doors seemingly effortlessly, although there were no visible hinges. "Well," he said with a flourish. "Here's the entrance." He met the doubting glances with a knowing grin. "Just follow me."

So he disappeared down the stone steps. Jack followed. Sally looked around, as if searching for somebody to stop her, and then slowly descended as well. The doors shut behind her in a way that was supposed to be ominous, but not quite.

* * *

Right then. That's all. Yes, nothing very interesting happened, but hopefully there will be glorious action in the next chapter.

I've always kept wondering why Deadly Nightshade was called Deadly Nightshade if Dr. Finkelstein never died from it. But then again, seeing as this is Halloween Town, he's probably already dead...but then again, I've always viewed him as being alive and not a zombie and stuff...

Until then, and stuff.

Please read and review. And stuff.

And stuff.

* * *


	6. The Unluckys

Geez, I finally post this thing. I'm really disappointed in this one too, as I think it moves too quickly and it's too short and it's not very interesting or anything like that. Of course, as the writer of this story, I think everything I write sucks. Also, this is the time in the story where the writer just can't think of what to write. It happens all the time. You start a new story, all ready and rearing to go and so on, but then a few chapters later, even with really nice people reviewing and so on, you just run out of things to write. Even if you have plenty of plot points, you just can't connect the dots.

Well anyways, here it is. The sixth chapter.

* * *

_The Unluckys_

How exciting a place is purely depends on something called 'perspective.' For example, Halloween Town would be truly an exciting and scary and all-around new place to wander in, but to the residents of the town, it was just home. They weren't really bored with it, but they didn't see anything special about it, anything worth being excited about, except for Halloween, of course. But anyways, imagine the awe you would feel if you somehow were stolen away in the night and winded up in Halloween Town, how you would ogle at the two-faced Mayor and the scenery, all of which everybody else in Halloween Town would consider as normal.

Now this is generally what Jack and Sally felt after they emerged from a cemetery out of a gravestone that was remarkably similar to the one they entered except for the statue. Oogie, being a veteran, just grinned at their awe and pointed out things he thought they would be interested in, like the cars, which were totally unlike the Mayor's Mayormobile, which was old, black, and sputtered a lot. These cars were sleek, came in different sizes and colors, and zoomed in an awfully majestic way compared to the Mayormobile, even if they were generally covered in dirt.

The witches and the demon never really said much about this place, only saying that it wasn't much different from Halloween Town. Jack now thought it was incredibly unfair for them to keep this a secret and that possibly they were thinking of some other place because this was very different. Like how everything seemed much bigger, sleeker, and more colorful than in Halloween Town. It was simply amazing.

Sally looked around at this strange new scenery and said, "We aren't supposed to be here."

"Eh, so what if they say we're only allowed on Halloween, and only if we're old enough? I've been here plenty of times and nothing happened to me."

"So, what's this place called?" Jack asked, still looking around at healthy (not gnarled!) trees and the green grass and the buildings that weren't even remotely painted black. Oogie shrugged because he never really bothered to find out the name anyways.

Generally what happened next was that the trio wandered around aimlessly, seeing the sights and so on and so forth, so it really is pretty useless to describe what they did.

So let's cut over to some random guy.

His name is William Cavelle, but his friends called him Billy. He thought it was kind of cool because he thought it was sort of like Billy the Kid because his real name was William too. But enough of that.

Billy was a very irritated scrawny teenager around this time, for he had braces. You probably know what braces are, but you would have to experience them yourself to actually know what kind of pain Billy was going through. The pressure put forcibly on his teeth to align them perfectly in the most malicious way possible was simply excruciating. Billy found that he had a surprising amount of hatred reserved for rubber bands now, especially really small ones.

So surly Billy walked around town in that oddly awkward way that teenagers do, telling himself not to touch his teeth with his tongue and then immediately touching them gingerly. His parents were at work and his homework was done. There was a party at some schoolmate's house hosted by said schoolmate's brother-in-college and not-so-surprisingly, he wasn't invited. The only people who were supposed to be invited were all, coincidentally, people he didn't know (nor did he particularly care about them) and random college guys (who, when they came back from whatever college they went to, always started up some kind of party or another. (By the way, it actually didn't matter if you were invited or not because there was nobody at the door to turn you away if you didn't have an invitation. It was just for the sake of it. Everybody ended up at the party at some point, invitation or not.) The quaint town would suddenly be filled with toilet paper (not on toilet paper rolls inside houses, where they belonged) and drunk college boys and girls and sometimes vomit. After a few years of this, Billy figured that he wouldn't want to go to those types of parties anyways. He had a feeling he would wake up in some house he'd never seen, having done a thing he would dearly regret.)

There really wasn't a lot to do tonight.

Billy went into a nearby 7-Eleven to buy some soda and saw the strangest three kids he had ever seen.

All three of them appeared to have dressed up for Halloween a little too early. About a month early, actually. One of them had painted her skin blue and drew stitches and wore a small, ragged dress. Another apparently just got lazy and used some kind of sack, though as Billy watched, he did notice some bugs, almost out of sight, around the holes for the mouth and eyes. In fact, the boy found it weird that the mouth could even move like that even though it was only a costume. He wasn't concerned that he couldn't see the face behind the eyeholes or the mouth-hole because it was probably some black fabric. The last guy was a skeleton who apparently decided to dress in some sort of black pinstripe suit. Billy vaguely thought that it was a rather weird costume idea. What was he supposed to be? A dead skeleton lawyer?

They were all, Billy estimated, around his age. It was hard to tell with the skeleton guy because he was amazingly tall. Okay, that was an exaggeration, but still. The skeleton guy was pretty damn tall. Likewise, the girl was a little too short. The sack guy was sort of in the middle, but seemed older than the others. Maybe it was the way he carried himself around.

The sack-bug person seemed to be arguing with the bored-looking employee behind the counter. Billy could hear one side of it loud and clear because the sack guy was shouting so loud. He was shouting things like "You consider this kind of green paper _that_ valuable?!" and "This is ridiculous!" and "Look, this thing here is worth at least as much as those; maybe even more. It's a fair exchange, don't you think? Better than bits of paper?"

At this point, Billy just decided to go ahead and get his drink. By the time he walked back to the counter, the three were getting ready to leave, the sack guy with a very happy look on his face. On the counter was something Billy had never seen before. It looked slightly evil, but it wasn't moving, so he really didn't think about it that much. Behind the counter, where an employee usually stood, was an employee. That was soon changed when the employee, figuring out that he should faint right about now, fell to the ground.

Then the detectors at the door started beeping since the employee hadn't had a chance to scan the various junk food and drinks they had 'purchased.' Billy decided that he should probably leave the money on the counter and run before the police got off of their fat asses and came to an assumption that he was some kind of delinquent.

He saw the three kids still walking away nonchalantly, no idea that technically, they had committed a juvenile act. They didn't seem to mind the alarms or anything. Billy jogged a little to catch up with them. "Hey. Hey!" The three turned, two of them slurping on a smoothie. The skeleton guy and the girl, to be exact.

Billy hesitated, because he had no idea whatsoever why he suddenly decided to run up to them. Maybe because he was bored and they were interesting. As Billy stuttered, searching for something to say, the sack guy stared at him irritably while the other two just continued slurping on their smoothies. Billy vaguely noticed that the girl's drawn stitches didn't really look like they were drawn.

"So…uh…you do know you just sort of…uh…stole back there, right? I mean, you might get in trouble with the cops." It sounded lame. The sack guy seemed to think so too.

"Hey, we gave 'im something in return, didn't we? That isn't stealing." His two friends behind him nodded as they slurped.

That was…uh…bartering, wasn't it? They said something like that in school once. People used to do it long ago, but found it was much less troublesome to just use money. Billy wisely decided not to voice his thoughts, which had gone along the lines of 'That's sorta primitive, right? Bartering?' Instead, he asked something else. "Never seen anybody do bartering anymore…where do you come from then? Pretty sure you ain't from Kentucky." Or maybe not even from the US itself. They sort of reminded Billy of aliens. The kind that played pranks on farmers and chopped down their crops using some sort of alien laser beam thing, maybe.

"Well," the skeleton guy said between slurps. "We're from Halloween Town." For some reason, the sack guy, who seemed to act as leader of the group, got irritated and pushed the skeleton guy away from Billy and forced them to start walking away. Maybe he got fed up with Billy wasting his time. The skeleton guy was startled and dropped his smoothie. Although Billy knew this was a highly obvious sign that he wasn't wanted (at least by the sack guy), he went ahead and followed them. They were acting very suspicious anyways (the sack guy, at least) – he felt he should follow the trio to see what they were really up to.

"Halloween Town? Weird name. I know a lot of weird city names, like there's one city somewhere called 'Garbage' and another called 'Hell,' that's my favorite by the way, but I've never heard of Halloween Town before. I don't think there are really a lot of towns anymore anyways. Only cities. Which state is Halloween Town in anyways?"

"State?" asked the skeleton guy, as if he had never heard the word used in that way before.

"Nowhere you know," the sack guy replied gruffly, hoping that the annoying boy would take the hint and go away. The annoying boy continued to trail behind them.

"So, what did you do to that guy anyways?" Billy asked, remembering the cashier that had fainted after confronting the strange trio.

"Nothing much," the sack guy grumbled. "Only scared him 'bout half to death. He'll be fine…though I guess he's lost a few years…" The sack guy seemed to mull over this for a few seconds. The girl offered the skeleton her own smoothie, but he politely declined, saying it was alright, she didn't have to. Then the sack guy turned his attention back to Billy and gave him a look that said, 'What? You're still here?'

Billy hesitated a bit at what the sack guy said. 'Half to death' was just a figure of speech. It was, wasn't it? But the sack guy said it pretty seriously… "That's…that's bad though. You…really shouldn't kill somebody…try to make someone dead and stuff…" Billy said uneasily.

"He's not _dead_, idiot, only halfway to death."

"What's wrong with being dead?" That was the skeleton guy this time, who, now that there was no more smoothie to slurp, took an active role in the conversation. He also looked slightly offended. Billy hesitated at this too because the skeleton guy was acting like he actually _was_ dead. But that wasn't possible. The walking undead was only in movies…

"What do you mean 'what's wrong with being dead?'" Billy gave out a hollow laugh, though it was quickly knifed and died in his throat. "Dead is…well, dead. I mean…well…I'd rather not be dead. Nobody knows what happens after death, you know? There's only…um…I dunno, a Great Perhaps."

"Well, I'm dead. Does that ease your mind a bit?" the skeleton guy asked, staring seriously at Billy. Billy noticed that his mask moved quite realistically as well.

"Well…uh…erm…" Billy replied. He felt the hair on his neck rise in a very clichéd fashion. The guy was just saying it so casually and…well, it was eerie. If he had said it any other way, like in an overly creepy way as used in old movies, he would have immediately not believed it…but…it was just said so matter-of-factly without a twitch or a smirk or anything. Billy had a feeling the skeleton guy was telling the truth and not just joking around with him. "But…you're walking and stuff. And you were drinking that slurpee. And you're…well…not in a cemetery…or a coffin…or underground…and stuff."

"You're getting on my nerves," the sack guy grumbled.

"Well, of course I'm walking around. Just because I'm dead doesn't mean I can't walk," the skeleton said rather confused.

"Yeah. He's a scary walking undead guy. Will you leave now?"

Billy gulped, but he really wasn't feeling very scared. A bit shocked and nervous, maybe, but the three didn't seem much of a threat. They seemed nice, actually, except for the sack guy. "Oh. Sorry about…well…" The skeleton gave him a puzzled look. "Uh…so…what was it like to…you know, die?"

"Oh, I never died," Jack said with a dismissive wave of his bony hand. The only suitable reaction Billy could think of was opening and closing his mouth several times.

Finally, he thought of another reaction besides running away. "So…you're not dead…?"

"Oh no, I'm quite dead." His tone was too affable for Billy's liking and it wasn't making it any easier to have a casual conversation. He started thinking about how suspicious and weird they all were. Maybe the skeleton guy only _thought_ he was dead. Maybe the sack guy actually did something horrible to that poor employee. Maybe he had just ran into a trio of insane people who had just escaped from an asylum or something. That's why they were wearing weird costumes. Because they're insane. True, they acted sort of normal, but he had read somewhere that insane people can seem normal on the outside, but then it turns out they cut up people and put the bloody pieces in plastic bags for fun. Maybe he really should leave before they started getting insanely violent.

"…Yeah. Well, it's been nice talking to ya, I guess…"

"Finally."

"There's actually a party I was planning on going to," Billy fibbed, as the only excuse he could think of was that college party that should be starting. Suddenly, the sack guy gave him a frighteningly interested look and Billy thought that maybe that was the wrong lie to make. When a possibly insane person has his attention on you, you can never know what is running through his insane mind. Is he going to kill you? Rape you? (Oh god, I hope not, Billy quickly thought.) Knife you and leave you in the gutters? It's an unnerving feeling, not knowing if and how someone is going to kill you.

"A party?" he asked. "…What kind of party?" the insane sack guy leered, slowly advancing towards Billy. The boy backed away, trying not to panic but failing miserably as he couldn't help but think that the sack guy was going to chop him up with a large cleaver or maybe ask him where the party was first and then chop him up and then chop everybody at the party up. The skeleton guy would probably join, saying cheerfully that death isn't so bad.

"N-nothing interesting," Billy stuttered, wishing that he had just left them alone right at the beginning. He should've known better than to follow kids that didn't even know what money was. "Just a bunch of older guys, college age…I mean, I'm only allowed in 'cause…uh…I have a brother in college…I don't think they would let you in…not that there's anything wrong with you guys, just that college guys can be, well, selective about who goes in…I guess it's sort of being discriminatory 'gainst age, but then again, they do drink a lot there and barf, so I guess young kids shouldn't be there, but my friends sometimes go anyways even though it smells bad…hey, you know how the KKK was very discriminatory 'gainst color and lynched black people and wore sheets like a ghost costume and stuff? Well, I sort of wonder what sheets they use, like do they use their bed sheets, and do they clean them before they go off killing people, and what do they use? Like, I don't know what kind of detergent stuff they use back then anyways…" Billy felt the sidewalk end and nervously looked down. Yup, he had backed up a little too far and was now at the curb.

The insane sack guy looked annoyed. "You only had to say it was a frat party. You didn't have to go blathering about bed sheets." Then he turned to his two friends again. "Well, looks like we came at the right time! You're gonna see one of those wild parties. It's fun, really great – you'll see…" Billy took this chance to turn and run…only he forgot that the road had been directly behind him. He ran right into the middle of the street, just as a car was driving down his way. The bright headlights froze him – he could only stare in horror as the car quickly advanced, its horn wildly honking…oh god, he was surely going to die…he could see the driver's face behind the windshield, wildly trying to swerve in time, but it would be too late…

"Woah there," the skeleton guy said, using his long, limber arms to pull him back out of the car's way. The car zoomed harmlessly by. "That's dangerous, you know. Running right in front of an automobile would even break some of my bones."

"Urgh," Billy murmured faintly, still stunned by his near-death experience. That was much too close for comfort. He tried not to blink because whenever his eyes closed, he could see the car bearing down on him, then running him over, leaving behind a sad splatter of bloody flesh and bones on the road...he took in a sharp breath. That was extremely unlucky.

"Jeez, don't be so careless. Now why don't you go ahead and take us to that party you were talkin' 'bout?" Billy had a feeling that the sack guy wasn't all that concerned that he had almost died.

"W-wait, Oogie…" The girl shook. Billy noticed that she had dropped her own smoothie in shock. "Think about what he just went through…maybe we should wait…we don't have to go now or anything…" The skeleton guy also looked uncomfortable about this idea.

"Then what better way to raise his spirits than a party, hm?" Nobody objected to this retort. Billy was still a little too shocked to protest this line of reasoning or offer his own opinion on his current mental condition. "Now let's go. Here – you lead."

"Urgh," Billy said. He didn't resist when the sack guy – Oogie, he was called – pushed him forward. Billy immediately stumbled into a nearby pole.

"Oogie…" the girl frowned. "Be a little more careful. He was almost run over…it's a scary experience…"

"Not for me, it ain't," Oogie promptly replied, but he still let the girl lightly grasp Billy's hand so that he wouldn't go wandering off into another pole (or the same one again).

The girl put her other hand onto Billy's forearm and looked anxiously into his eyes. "Do you think you're okay enough? To lead the way?"

Instead of saying what he really felt, ("No, I am _not_ okay, of course I'm not okay, I just almost got run over, that was the most terrifying experience of my _life_, I'm so scared I'm just about pissing myself in fear, I just want to go home and cry into my pillow until I feel better, you guys are _crazy_, I don't want to have anything to do with you guys anymore, I'm leaving, ect. ect.") Billy held it in and said, "Y-yeah, fine…I can do it."

So he led them to the party (gosh, that sounds so…anticlimactic, sort of…). Yeah, that's right; he didn't have the guts to run away again, after the near-death experience. He also didn't have the guts to just lead them around in circles either. He was too disoriented to consider that he could prevent these madmen (and woman) from going there and possibly chopping everybody into pieces. Either that or he was scared that they would chop him into pieces if he didn't lead them.

The house where the party was being held at was a bit far away so Billy had plenty of time to think. Since he figured he had to find some other nicknames for the crazy people besides 'the skeleton guy' and 'the girl', he decided to call them the Unluckys. It was a fitting name, seeing that almost immediately after he met them, he almost got run over and ran into a pole. Also, a large dog mauled his leg and he knocked that same leg on a newspaper stand. Not to mention that biker that ran over his toe or the tree that just seemed to bend over and whack him in the face with a branch or the random alley cat that came over, dropped a dead mouse in front of him, and promptly barfed on his shoes. And then there was that girl he had never met with a large umbrella who walked up to him, slapped him, and then swung the closed umbrella up between his legs. "That's what you get," she sniffed before walking away.

"Urgh," Billy had responded.

"Huh, you're pretty unlucky today, ain't ya?"

"Interesting. It isn't even a Friday Thirteenth."

"I shouldn't pry…but what was she talking about?" The girl asked as she helped Billy up for about the third time that night.

"I would feel slightly better if I knew," the poor, abused boy muttered. "But not by much."

Billy decided to call Oogie, the sack guy, Major Unlucky because of the way he carried himself around, like he was the boss of everything. The nice girl he decided to call Lovely Unlucky. He decided to never say it out loud because it would sound stupid. And finally, because the skeleton guy seemed polite and British-like or something, Billy decided that a simple Mr. Unlucky would do.

They arrived at a house. It looked exactly like a normal house except for the broken glass bottles on the lawn and dizzy, drunk-looking people littering the porch, and weird, ultra-loud noises leaking through the doors and windows.

"Here. I'm leaving now," Billy announced.

"Are you sure you don't want to stay?" asked Mr. Unlucky.

"No. I'm very sure I don't want to." Billy then turned around and walked away very quickly before Lovely Unlucky could convince him to stay, at least to rest his throbbing leg (and 'nether regions') if nothing else. This whole unlucky night creeped him out (and was rather annoying) and he just wanted to leave before some other girl he never met whacked him with something worse than an umbrella.

Jack and Sally watched the boy leave for a while before turning to head towards the door. "I think he's scared of us," Jack said happily

"Do you really think so?" Sally asked. If she could, she might have been blushing lightly then. After all, she wasn't the kind of mad scientist creation people would call 'scary.'

"If you're done watching that guy leave now, I'm going inside," Oogie shouted loudly from the doorway, in case the other two couldn't hear him over the din of the party.

"I could tell by the way he kept looking over his shoulder at us," Jack replied.

"The door is unlocked and all, so I'm opening it."

"I thought that was just uneasiness."

"No, I'm pretty sure that was fear."

"I've found a table full of stupid drunk guys with a pack of cards, some chips, and a lot to lose."

"I think he's nice…it's sad he's so unlucky though…I would like to help him out…"

"They also don't have poker faces. So yeah. I'm going over there. To play poker and stuff. I mean, if you aren't going to go inside and all…"

"Don't worry. I think his luck will improve later. That always happens to people right? They have a really bad day, and then it suddenly gets better."

"So, yeah. You know where to find me. I guess. If you've been listenin' to what I've said at all." Oogie then lumbered over to the drunk guys with no poker faces and 'a lot to lose,' apparently.

Jack and Sally spent a few more seconds chatting about mundane things that nobody will ever be interested in before finally turning around and realizing that Oogie left them some time back.

"…I guess he already went in," Jack said.

They both seemed to realize just how loud the party was and how many people there were inside the house.

"…Do you think we can find him when we leave…?" Sally suddenly looked rather reluctant to go inside the noisy house. Especially since there was a guy whooping and hollering on the roof.

"Don't worry. It's only one house, right? Let's just go inside now. We can worry about the rest later." Jack gently took Sally's hand and led her in.

* * *

A really sucky ending too. Gawsh. I'm sorry.

Also, there's my Mr. Unlucky explanation. I didn't really think about how that might turn out. I guess I improvised as I went along.

'But Sei! Jack doesn't know that his nickname is Mr. Unlucky!'

Well, that's coming up later. So shut up.

By the way, I might have been influenced to name the poor guy Billy because of another fanfic I read a while back...


	7. A Heist

This is finally done! The moment you all (all three of you) have been waiting for! Chapter seven! Woooo!

Sorry this took a while, I got stuck on this ONE PART. It was ridiculous. And then I had an epiphany or something like that and now it's done. If anybody still wants to read it, there's no OMGWHATHAPPENSNEXTASDIXCVJKG cliffhanger at the end. Also, this is probably the last chapter Billy will appear in. Also, this chapter is long, but I still somehow think it's rushed. I MUST BE POSITIVE.

Okay, now read. And then review.

* * *

_A Heist Happens_

"That's a Royal Flush," Oogie said smugly as the other players moaned and threw down their hands (their cards, not their actual hands) in despair. The Boogieman just grinned and sat back in his chair as the others unwillingly pushed their chips towards him. This was just too easy. Though even Oogie would be the first to admit he didn't have the best poker face, these guys were even worse, and it didn't help them that they were currently drunk and/or hung over. So far, he didn't even have to resort to cheating. They were just so phenomenally bad. It was hilarious.

"So," Oogie said, leering dangerously at the drunk guys surrounding the table and pushing his cards towards the dealer. "How 'bout another round?"

* * *

The police officer paced across the office a few times before stopping again in front of the unhappy-looking teen. He couldn't see his face under the messy mop of brown hair, but he gave him the professional Intimidating Police Glare anyways.

It seemed to work, despite the fact there was no eye contact – the boy cringed.

"So you didn't do anything." The boy didn't respond. There was just something in the tone of the officer's voice that told him not to. He started pacing again, his shoes making a small pattering sound on the office floor. "And yet you ran." He turned back, stopped, and leaned down to the sitting boy, face to almost-face. The brown-haired boy winced again as the officer whispered, "Why?"

A long silence. But apparently the officer heard something. "What was that? Louder."

"…Wouldn't you?" the boy repeated softly, then quickly added, "Sir." The officer stared at him some more before finally backing away. Instead of pacing, he turned around and stared at the door. The boy took this time to glance around the room because the carpet was getting boring.

He could feel the desk behind him, as well as the towering pile of papers that, once in a while, would partly collapse. A quick look backwards told him that all the papers were in the IN box while there was nothing in the OUT one. The chair behind the desk looked very much like the one he was sitting in now. Stiff and uncomfortable. There was a bright lightbulb somewhere on the ceiling. After that, there was nothing of interest. Apparently, this guy didn't read books or have anything to amuse himself with in this room. The nameplate on the desk was hard to read, as it was directly behind him and partly covered by papers. He could only make out 'Sa ime .' The name might have been also printed on the door, but the officer was standing right in front of it.

"…Anybody would run if a policeman suddenly pointed at you, shouted 'That's him!' and started running towards you…sir."

"Well, that's because everybody's guilty of something. I just want to know if you're guilty of something particular today." The boy noticeably twitched. "Yes, it involved a certain store…"

"I didn't do anything," the boy said angrily, but softly. He didn't want to provoke the officer, who looked like he could easily wrestle him down. Then again, he had spent most of his life watching TV and playing video games, so probably the majority could easily wrestle him down.

"Yes, we know," the officer replied, making the boy's head shoot up.

"But why – "

"We just want to ask some questions." The officer paused right there, as if waiting for the boy's consent.

The boy stared at his knees for a while. "…I didn't know them, okay? I just happened to meet them."

"Them? It was the work of one guy."

"Well, I guess, technically…he did say he scared him half to death and I don't think the others did anything…"

"What others? There was only one guy."

"What do you mean? I saw three…" The officer turned around and shook his head.

"…What is your name?"

"Billy."

"Well, Billy, I think you're confused. We already know about the three earlier, that triggered the alarm in the first place. I'll have to deal with them later, but you should know that not long after you left, a man walked in, apparently planning a break-in as soon as you left. He had a gun, but since the cashier fainted, all he had to do was take the money out of the register and leave."

Billy's mouth shot opened and he remained speechless for a while. "So they _just happened_ to make some guy faint in time for a guy who _just happened_ to choose that very store for some robbery?"

"Well, yes. I think that sums it up quite nicely."

"And you think _I_ know something about this?"

"Well," he said quietly, and here, the officer's stern face actually broke into an amused smile, "Between you and me, the men really needed something to do. But maybe you can still help me." The officer opened the door and stood to the side as three cops immediately fell over to the ground. The officer didn't seem very surprised at this.

"Uh, hello there," one of them said hesitantly. "We were just…ah…about to knock."

"Ah, good of you to join us, Mr. Collins, Knobb, Teal," the officer said, nodding to each of them. They hastily stood up. The portly Mr. Collins tried to suck in his gut. "I was just about to call you, Mr. Collins. Do you mind bringing in the TV? And the tape as well."

"I'll get right on it!" And the man was off, glad that he wouldn't have to explain it. It was someone else's problem now.

The other two didn't want it to be their problem either. "We'll…ah, just help him. If you don't mind. That telly can be really tricky to move. The wheels sometimes stick, you know."

The only answer was an, "I see." Knobb and Teal took this as a sign to get out quickly. Billy quickly glanced upwards and saw that the officer was grizzled. He looked as if he didn't care whether his hair was combed or not, nor did he care that he wasn't clean-shaven. The boy suspected that if he wasn't in uniform, he would've looked like a homeless, drunk bum.

Eventually the TV was wheeled in on a shaky cart by the three, and they quickly walked out the door again.

"Now," said the officer, pacing towards the TV slowly, "this is the tape from the security camera of that store…" As he passed the door, he kicked it hard. On the other side, someone said something like 'ack' followed by the sound of three men falling over. Billy wondered if he would ever take the police seriously ever again.

The video played and the officer fast-forwarded it to when Billy left. The alarm triggered by The Unluckies stopped after a few minutes (people realized that when an alarm went off, it was exceedingly annoying after only a minute and it didn't even take a minute for somebody to figure out what was going on) and a figure dressed in all black stumbled in, sporting the highly fashionable burglar ski mask. There was very clearly, a gun in his hand. He shook it around vaguely, then realized that there was nobody to shake it around at and wobbled towards the cash register. Billy could hear him call out, "Uhhh, hello?" tentatively before he looked over the counter and apparently saw the employee because he jumped backwards. After making sure the man behind the counter wasn't getting up and shouting, the burglar took no time at all emptying the register and stuffing the cash into his sack. Before he left, he noticed something on the counter, and decided to swipe that too. The officer paused the tape.

"And then we arrived," he said, leaning against the wall. "Well? What did you notice?" Billy squirmed under the expectant stare.

"He seemed very new to the…erm, job." The man nodded and waited for Billy to continue. "Um," the boy said, flustered, "Very inexperienced, nervous…"

"Could you tell how old he was?" the officer asked. Billy realized that he probably already knew everything. He was just waiting for him- him, of all people! – to say it.

"Uh, hard to tell…the camera angle wasn't so good…but he wasn't old. Not like an adult. He wasn't in high school either…maybe in betwe-" The boy froze as a thought just occurred to him. The officer merely nodded again.

"College age, inexperienced, nervous…always hated those types," he said smoothly. "They always end up hurting themselves and whining about it later. The experienced criminals actually know how to shoot a gun and stay quiet after they're caught. Partly quiet, anyways. Billy, you seemed to have realized something," he added cheerfully. "Care to tell me what?"

"I...uh…I think you know already…" the boy mumbled.

"Oh, just indulge an old officer, would you?" the man replied affably.

"…College kids just visiting…made a party…"

"Ah yes, you're saying that some students are celebrating their time away from studying, or whatever it is they do back at their universities, and our bumbling robber here could have come from said party. In fact, he could be drunk. So now we have a stupid, inexperienced, drunk robber with a gun, and that's a combination of words I really don't like. So let's say this guy went to a party and got drunk. Maybe someone planted this stupid idea in his mind about robbing some small store. He goes and robs it. Where would he go now? If you'd like to hear my guess, I'd say that, being drunk and stupid, he'd go back to the party and brag about what he pulled off to his buddies." Billy nodded mutely.

"You know more about thieves than I do, sir…" he murmured.

"Damn right, I do," the officer replied and opened the door again. This time, nobody tumbled inside the room in a hilarious manner. "Alright, boys! We've got the info we need! Let's go!" Billy stood up and peered over the officer. He could see the three eavesdropping men among the many officers milling around.

"Um, can I leave?" he asked tentatively.

"You'll be riding in my car," the man replied jovially, slapping Billy on the shoulder. Billy almost collapsed. "I still don't know where to go, so you'll be giving me directions." Knobb, Collins and Teal shuffled up to the officer, looking bashfully towards the floor or any other object besides the officer's face. Before they could say anything, the officer smiled at them and said, "Ah, good. I was about to talk to you three. Good job finding the boy. Without him, we wouldn't have gotten valuable information. Now that you've done your part, we're going to do ours; have the rest of the night off, you deserve it." There was the sound of three sighs of relief being held in and the three men nodded and wandered off, looking happy that they were useful and they would not have to confront a possibly dangerous man with a gun.

Billy, feeling that he had just learned something about reverse psychology, mutely followed the officer to the car.

* * *

It only took a quick change in an alleyway and he was a normal college student again. It was amazing.

He had hidden a backpack away here earlier and now stuffed the bag's contents inside. The gun was tucked into a pocket for convenience, should he ever need it. The burglar walked back out casually, his head buzzing with excitement and alcohol. He did it. He actually pulled it off!

The man tried to act normal, but almost giggled as someone with an umbrella passed him without even a second glance. There was nothing particularly funny, but the whole thing was just so surreal. He had just stolen a bunch of money and was no doubt going to be sought after by the police and here he was, just walking around like an average guy. It was like having a secret identity, someone he could become to do things that he would normally never try to do, such as rob a store. And nobody would suspect him, of course.

The trouble with having a secret identity is that there is always an urge to tell somebody about it, like some trusted friends who would never ever tell anybody else until they tell somebody else.

He walked into the house and immediately headed for the poker table where his friends were looking very sober all of a sudden. There was some new kid over there too, dressed in a sack or something, looking very smug.

"Hey guys," the robber said, ignoring all those little details. "I've _got_ to tell you something."

"Not now!" one of his friends said testily. "Shit, that was all I had! What 'm I supposed to do now!"

"He's cheating. He's gotta be cheating," another moaned as he threw down his cards again.

"Hey, d'you see any sleeves?" the sack boy said, raising his arms as emphasis. "You all're just really bad players."

As the sack guy chuckled, the robber looked around at his friends, as if just realizing they had all just lost badly. "'Ere, don't worry guys, I've got lots of money with me."

The most competitive of his friends, intent on beating the damn smug bastard and winning all his money back, replied, "Lemme borrow some of that, then."

The smarter one said, "Hey, where'd you get that money?"

At this point, most people would hesitate at even telling their most trusted friends the answer. This thought briefly bounced around the man's drunken mind, but he still said, matter-of-factly, "I stole it from that store nearby," without even a second thought. This obviously caused a few stares from his friends, but the man didn't notice. He didn't even notice a few of the smarter ones edging away from him or outright leaving, as if his criminality would suddenly latch itself onto them. He did notice the evil stare the sack boy was giving him.

Something in the robber's head clicked, and he leaned forward towards the sack boy. "'Ey," he murmured, trying to sound cool, but instead spitting beer-breath towards the boy's face. "Don' tell anybody 'bout what you just heard, 'kay? Here, I'll even give you some money, 's long as you keep silent."

The sack kid gave a sadistic grin in return, which the amateur robber found very disconcerting. "I'm not interested in that," he told the robber. "Here's something more interesting – Let's play some cards, and if I win, I'll call the police. If you win, well...I won't call."

"And give us back our money!" Someone at the table protested.

"Fine with me," conceded the sack boy, his grin growing as he shuffled the cards adroitly. The robber watched the cards dance in those sack nubs in awe, and somewhere inside rose a mounting horror. The robber realized that there was a possibility he would go to jail, just by losing a card game. Of course, if he won, he would be home free. There was also the bonus of winning back his friends' money, which they would certainly be rather ecstatic about. He only needed to win.

But he might lose.

The thought of losing made his hands shake, and from this fear, a devil arose. The devil whispered things into his ear, planting very tempting ideas in his mind. You took the money, said the devil. It's yours. Why should anybody threaten you? Why should anybody threaten to take away what is already yours? Don't be afraid, there's an easier way out of this…

The devil guided his hand to his pocket.

* * *

"I could use a drink," Jack suddenly said.

The party, which had mostly been fueled by alcohol, was now starting to slow down as many people suddenly found the lights blinding or the room spinning. Jack and Sally weaved their way through stumbling college students towards a table piled with bowls of chips and salsa and other various things.

During Oogie's whole game and part of the party, Jack and Sally actually had a pretty good time. Not a lot of people paid much attention to them besides a few incredulous stares, and some of the songs were pretty good. It had been a bit too noisy before, but eventually the loud din diminished to a few grumbles and some moans.

Jack scooped some kind of brown-ish liquid in a cup and took a sip. He resisted the urge to spit it back out and politely set the cup back down. The drink stung his throat badly and was horribly bitter. If he had tear ducts, his eye sockets would be watering. Searching for a way to silently express his dislike, the lanky skeleton settled for simply saying, "Ick."

"It looks like most people are leaving," Sally said, careful to not ask asinine questions such as, 'How does it taste?'

"Okay then," Jack replied. "Let's find Oogie and go back home. Some people might be looking for us at this hour." The two walked around the house, moving closer to the door as they went along, when suddenly there was a sickening BANG. They briefly froze, startled, before they ran towards the source of the sound, as well as did several other curious partiers who were still standing.

Eventually, the group came upon an overturned poker table and several frightened men. One of them was holding a gun, which was now hanging loosely in his grip. They all were staring at Oogie, who was clutching his head and cursing very loudly – far from dead, as the shooter probably didn't expect.

Oogie shouted more profanities and stepped towards the shooter menacingly, which prompted the shooter to yelp pathetically and shoot two times. Oogie leapt backwards, cursing a lot more and leaking bugs, which understandably horrified the shooter some more.

Jack and Sally rushed up to their friend, shouting his name in concern while he started voicing loud threats towards the terrified man. Then the door burst open, revealing several policemen who piled in. One of them pointed to the shooter and they jumped towards him, but hurriedly stepped back when he started shooting again. The robber, acting on instinct, grabbed Sally and pointed his gun to her head. Above her screaming he yelled, "GET AWAY!" which everybody did, careful not to accidentally startle him into firing the gun again.

The robber quickly took his backpack and pointed the gun at Sally's head again, inducing a soft whimper from her, and slowly sidled over to the door. He looked around wildly at everybody, so that nobody was ever out of his sight for more than a second, but there was no need. Nobody moved, and the air had a strained quality to it.

"Um, if any of you try an' come after me," he threatened nervously before finishing off with a lame, "…the girl'll get it." The man backed out the screen door and out of sight.

When the door shut with a sudden bang, the room exploded into shouts of, 'Was that…?', 'It was!', and 'But he isn't that kind of guy, is he?' Ebullient whispers passed along ridiculous rumors and soon all the false stories started mixing together until the whole situation was like a huge, distasteful Telephone game.

Jack, who had only stood still out of pure confusion, now looked around quickly for the familiar sack. "Oogie? Oogie!"

"What?" came the disgruntled reply. The boy pushed his way through the crowd, the hole in his sack now taped up to prevent any more bugs from falling out.

"Let's go, we have to save Sally! She must be terrified by now!"

"Look, the guy has a gun, and he already said that he would shoot Sally if anybody, including us, followed him. I wouldn't worry about it. He'll probably just dump Sally somewhere and make his escape. Even if he does shoot Sally, it's not like she'd die or anything."

Jack stared at him angrily for a few seconds before shaking his head and turning away. "You just don't get it." The tall skeleton dissolved into the crowd as he pushed his way to the exit, leaving Oogie behind. The police, too busy trying to settle the crowd, didn't even notice the door open.

He watched him go and stood there, pondering on his next move. Finally, he sighed. "The moron probably doesn't even know what a gun is." And with that conclusion, he slipped out the door just as the police finally got the crowd to settle down.

"Now," said the officer, "We need all of you to cooperate and answer our questions truthfully. My guys will make sure nobody gets any funny ideas and run out the door. None of you are in trouble," he added hastily, realizing that he sounded as if they were, "it's just something that would be helpful. Everybody conscious please wait for us to call you in the interro…the 'questioning' room. Which will be upstairs, in a room we can lock. And not the bathroom." As someone hurried to prepare a room, he turned to another cop. "You're in charge here."

The young cop narrowed his eyes. "Where are you going?"

"To pick up a smoke." The cop just narrowed his eyes some more.

"Sir, didn't you hear what he said? If you go after him, he'll shoot her!"

"Yeah, he did say that. Now go start the questioning." The man realized he had been defeated from the start, shrugged, and made his way up the stairs. The officer went out to get his smokes.

* * *

_What_, thought Billy as he hid behind a trashcan, _am I doing?_

He had stayed in the car, since the officer had told him to, and you don't disobey a man that was taller and stronger than you. He had then heard shots and saw somebody run out, dragging a smaller figure along. Looking closely, he recognized the taller one as the man on the security camera and the smaller one as the female Unlucky.

Immediately, he had opened the door and trailed the robber, hiding whenever he got too close or when the man looked this way and that for a place to run to.

Whenever Billy caught a glance of the man's face, he couldn't help but feel…slight pity for him. The expression was of fear, the 'oh shit what am I gonna do' expression. The boy tried to comprehend the feeling of being chased as a wanted criminal. Not being able to go home, not being able to hang out with your old friends, having to hide all the time…sounded like a crappy life. Another thing TVs are wrong about, Billy concluded.

He peered over the trashcan and through his mop of sandy hair, watched as the man desperately glanced around, and almost bit his tongue off when a boney hand rested on his shoulder.

He spun around quickly and bumped his nose on the skeleton's forehead. They both recoiled and gingerly rubbed their afflicted areas. "M-mr. Unlucky?" Billy whispered through his hands. The skeleton boy turned around, looking for this 'Mr. Unlucky.'

"He means you, moron," said the sack kid behind Mr. Unlucky.

"Wh-what are you…" Billy started, still holding his aching nose, but then remembered who the criminal was dragging along.

"Yeah, that's right. Mister Hero Guy over here just _had_ to come valiantly dashing in an' all, to rescue his girl," said the sack Unlucky sourly.

"It's not like that! I mean, we shouldn't just leave her behind. It's not right…"

"Yeah, whatever. Now where's that guy? Now that I'm here, I really wanna beat him up fer shootin' me…" The look that crossed the Major's face then was a horribly dark one. It was the look of someone you shouldn't cross – ever – or he would unleash horrible vengeance upon you. Maybe not today, maybe not tomorrow, but someday.

Billy quickly looked away. "Erm…well…I dunno." Apparently, during the whole conversation, the robber had suddenly decided to walk away. "…You were shot?! Where?!" he suddenly exclaimed, searching for blood stains on the sack. Major pointed a nub at his clumsily bandaged head, and Billy decided to try to forget he ever asked the question.

* * *

The robber stopped.

He was now in an alley. He had decided that, although he had no idea what the hell he should do now, the first thing was to dump his hostage now that she wasn't needed.

He pulled her in front of him and made her face the dead end. "Okay. I'm going to let go. You just…stay here for a while. Don't scream, or call for help, or else…I'll shoot you…" The petite girl just shivered in response. The robber bit his lip – it didn't feel right at all threatening a little girl like this. Sure, he had shot someone, but that was different somehow.

But…he would have to think about this later. Right now, he had to run to somewhere safe. As the man turned around, however, a trashcan toppled, followed by curses and queries of someone's wellbeing. The robber's nerves went haywire. Had he been found? By who? The police? Was he now cornered? Ohcrapohcrapohcrapohcrapohcrap…

He waited, trying not to make a sound. Then a skeleton walked into his line of sight and he yelped in surprise. The skeleton turned, noticed him standing there, and pointed towards him.

And that's when he started firing wildly.

Jack leapt away to the other side of the entrance to the alley, out of range, and waited until the bangs stopped. "I think – " he started, but was interrupted by another BANG.

"…I think I found them," he finished.

"Oh, I hadn't noticed," Oogie replied scathingly.

"Go away!" shouted a voice from inside the alley. As if the owner thought that there was a need for emphasis, he added, "…I have a gun!"

"That was apparent when you started _shooting_ at us!" Oogie yelled back, but made no move towards the alley for he wasn't very keen on being shot at again.

"Billy?" said another voice. The officer walked up and stared down at the morose-looking boy, ignoring Oogie for the moment. "Didn't I tell you to wait back in my car?" Billy looked down at his feet and stuttered out apologies, excuses, and whatever else his mind thought of at the moment. "…Never mind," said the officer. "I guess it's better to have a few witnesses anyways, even though they're only a bunch of kids…"

"Witnesses?" Billy repeated.

"Yeah, you'll understand later, hopefully. Just remember that it's only a coincidence that I went out for some smokes and heard…four…five gunshots and found that gun-waving idiot…now you two wait here…you wait over there too," he added to Jack at the other side, "and…well, witness."

"…What are you gonna do?" Billy asked, since it seemed the right thing to do.

"Just watch." The officer straightened, walked to the corner, and shouted, "This is the police! Why don't you come out now, and there won't be any more trouble?"

There was a pause from inside the alley, and then a hesitant, "I've got a gun!"

"So I've noticed. Are you or are you not giving yourself up?"

"…No…?"

"Alright then, you asked for it," sighed the officer, and he rounded the corner.

"He's gonna be shot, ain't he," Oogie hissed, and the three boys peered into the alley to see what would happen next and if the officer would indeed be shot to bits like The Boogeyman predicted.

The officer waited for his eyes to adjust to the surprisingly dark alley. He made a note to suggest putting up more street lights near these things. As soon as he could see everything clearly, he noticed that the hostage was shivering in the corner, scared, but still unharmed. He also noticed that there was a shaking gun pointed right at his head.

"Okay," he said, putting his hands up in a conciliatory manner. "Why don't you – "

"If you get any closer, I'll shoot!" The robber suddenly yelped. The officer frowned.

"Hey, let me finish. You didn't even hear everything I was going to say."

"I know what you were gonna say," the robber replied shakily. "You were gonna say 'Why don't you put that gun away.'"

"Good guess."

"Well I'm not gonna put my gun away! One step, an' I'll blow your head off, I swear!" The officer stared down the barrel of the gun for a while, before stepping backwards.

"I took a step. Are you going to shoot me now?" Nobody was very amused by his wit.

"…Just…stay there. Or I'll shoot!"

"So you keep saying."

"Yeah…stay there…and I'll run away. And don't think of chasing after me!" The officer put down his hands as a grim look suddenly crossed his face.

"Sorry, I'm a policeman." And he took a step towards the man.

The gun started quaking faster. "Don't! Stop right there!" Another step. "I…I'll shoot…" the robber threatened weakly. Another step. And the robber pulled the trigger.

The pistol simply clicked.

I have never been so relieved to be right, the policeman thought, and he tried his best to look unfazed. "Out of ammo, eh?" He tried to give a quirky smile, but found that he was still a little too tense to express anything other than that of stern disapproval. "You don't have a weapon anymo – " he was suddenly interrupted by an airborne pistol hitting him on the nose. It was very painful. As he was busy doubling over in pain, he could feel the other man run past him, and though he still wanted to groan in pain, he turned around and managed to pin the robber to the filthy ground.

"Okay," growled the officer, "_now_ you don't have a weapon. And if you try to punch me or kick me in the balls, I swear I'll…" Once again, the officer didn't have time to finish his sentence because the robber noticed his holster. With an impressive show of desperate strength, the robber managed to push the other man off and grab at the holster at the same time. Both men quickly got up, and once again the robber was pointing a gun.

"G-get away…I'll shoot if you don't…."

The officer stared coldly at him again and said, "I'll shoot. I'll shoot. Is that the only thing you can say? Well go ahead! Shoot!" The robber stared at him with wide, uncomprehending eyes. Impatiently, the man repeated, "Shoot! You have my gun. You've been threatening me. So go on!"

The robber's arm started shaking again. The devil appeared and whispered more evil things into his ear, tried to cajole him with pleasing images of the future, reached out towards the trigger to push it….

The gun dropped with a clatter and the robber fell to his knees. "…I'm in big trouble…" The officer grinned satisfactorily and walked up to pat the man on the head.

"You would've been in big trouble if you pulled that trigger. The way I see it, you'll be okay now."

"What are y' talking about?!" The robber wailed, stuffing his face into his hands. "I'm going to jail! I stole money! I ran away from the police! I _shot_ someone!"

"Yeah, we'll have to arrest you. You'll probably be locked up for…a year at most, I'd guess."

"A _year_?!" Oogie shouted, now walking into the alley since there was no danger of being shot at. "No way! More than that! He _shot_ me! In the _head_!" The officer frowned at Oogie for a bit.

"You seem rather sprightly for a dead guy," he finally said before turning away from the fuming boy. "You did rob a store, and you did fire a gun a lot, but I don't think you actually shot anyone. You might've damaged a wall or a car, but not an actual person. Basically, you threatened a lot, which really isn't much of a crime. You took a hostage, but," he looked up briefly towards Sally, who was now standing up and wiping away tears. "She seems to be physically unharmed and doesn't look like she's been mentally scarred. You did run away from the police, but then again, everybody runs from us," he finished with a wink.

"So I'm arresting you for robbing a store. That's all." The officer whipped out a pair of handcuffs and fettered the man's hands together. "Make sure to be an upstanding citizen from now on."

"That…was cool," was all Billy could say. He joined Jack and Oogie in the alley as the officer took out a radio and called some other men over. As they waited for a car to come, they comforted Sally. Some apologies were made, and some chatting was done. ("Mr. Unlucky, huh?") By the time the robber was taken into the car, he didn't seem all that scared anymore.

Another policeman drove the officer's car up. When he got out, he said, "The chief's gonna be angry at you."

"About what?" asked the officer innocently.

"You know what I mean. Following a guy with a hostage when he told you not to…the chief's gonna rave 'bout how the girl could've been shot with your 'reckless actions.'"

"I have no idea what you're talking about," said the officer. "I was only going out for some smokes when I heard gunshots and, like I'm supposed to do, went to investigate." The other man raised an eyebrow before getting into the passenger's seat.

"D'you want a ride home?" the officer asked Billy.

"It's okay, I can walk…" he replied, looking a little absorbed in his thoughts. The officer waited for a bit and then started to get into the car. "…That was really brave of you. I don't think I could've stood up to that gun."

The grizzled officer laughed. "You thought I was brave? That wasn't bravery. I was just smart." He took out his gun again, pointed it to the sky and pulled the trigger. It simply clicked.

Billy gawked for a second or two before finally finding the words to say, "…What would you've done if he shot…?"

"If he pulled the trigger? Well, I would've punched his lights out and dragged his sorry ass to jail myself. His sentence would probably be a bit longer too. Any more questions?"

"Um…what're you gonna do 'bout…" Billy looked over his shoulder, then quickly scanned the whole area.

"Those three? They're gone by now. Snuck off." The officer said dismissively.

Billy looked at him, bewildered. "But…they…weren't you supposed to…?" The officer chuckled.

"How 'bout I drive you home? Then we can talk about holidays…Halloween in particular, and about some weird guy who thought about a weird town…"

* * *

Now you've read it. So review. Go on, do it. Okay, I can wait...

Since I'm trying to be positive, I think this chapter is pretty good, except at the end. The officer seems like an all-knowing guy to me somehow, and I don't like that...but I didn't really want him to round up the three Unluckys and shout at them or something, so...that's the ending. Also, I don't know the average sentence for robbery, so I just made something up. I bet it's soooo unrealistic.

My favorite chapter is still Chapter 4.


	8. Everything Goes Downhill

**Right, here's the chapter! It ended up having an unsatisfactory ending, I think. (In fact, I'm beginning to not like this one...) Oh well, hope all you readers enjoy it.**

* * *

Everything Goes Downhill

None of the denizens of Halloween Town were amused when the trio returned.

Apparently, the Deadly Nightshade's effect wore off only a few minutes after they left. Dr. Finkelstein then immediately alerted the Mayor (who then announced it loudly later on) that Sally was missing, and then it was discovered that Jack was gone too and then the whole thing became a desperate search. During the search somebody suddenly spread a rumor that Oogie actually ate both of them and eventually everybody started believing this when Jack nor Sally could be found and were about to go on a rampage towards Oogie's house with flaming torches et al when the kids walked out the graveyard.

The mob was relieved that nobody had been eaten after all, but soon became angry that they wandered out. A lot of lectures were made and disappointed looks were directed towards Jack and Sally. Finkelstein seemed the most disappointed out of the whole town. In fact, he ranted a lot in front of the trio, shouting words like 'impudence' and 'ignominy' and then said something about 'pineapples.' (The last one was part of a metaphor, possibly.)

After feeling that they had shouted enough to make Jack and Sally feel guilty (Oogie seemed completely unfazed since he was probably used to the whole scolding thing), the townspeople stalked off to do whatever they needed to do, like sleep. Dr. Finkelstein took Jack aside before he rolled off with Sally.

"Jack," he started, and he sounded a bit worried, "you shouldn't stick around that…that boy. He's a bad influence." The short man hoped for any flicker of understanding in Jack's face, but found none. "He's not someone you should make friends with. He's a smooth-talker, a….well, the kind of guy that convinces you to do something…something that you would never do…something horrible. And when you get caught, he slips away, leaving you behind. He's that kind of guy." The doctor stared up at Jack hopefully, searching for any hint of understanding in the bony face.

"Oogie isn't that kind of guy," Jack replied coldly. He seemed to have understood perfectly. "Maybe he isn't the best, but he's not evil. He wouldn't do that." Without even a curt nod, the skeleton boy turned and left for his house. Finkelstein looked worried for a moment, but he knew it was best to talk later.

* * *

Sally was grounded again. Finkelstein wouldn't let Oogie, or even Jack inside, possibly because he was afraid they would sneak in some more Deadly Nightshade so Sally could sneak out again. This slightly ruined the boys' days, as now they only had each other to do stuff with. There was nobody to fearfully question their antics anymore or trail around shyly behind them. It was a very weird feeling, expecting someone to be there but knowing that there wasn't.

Oogie immediately put the blame on the old doctor. After all, if he hadn't locked her in, Sally would be with them, doing nothing much but at least being where they expected her to be.

Dr. Finkelstein seemed to have gained many years all of a sudden. He wheeled around the house in a rather distracted way and often stared somewhere at a distant, happy past, or sadly towards Sally. His hands shook more, causing him to drop beakers. Igor had to help him more often during his experiments, but the scientist didn't seem to want to do many of those anyways. Sally usually found her father asking her if she needed something, anything at all, as if trying to make up for over-sheltering her. It depressed her greatly.

But that didn't still stop her from feeling ecstatic when Finkelstein rolled up to her and finally said, "Sally? Ah…you should be in your teenage years now…If you want, I can….er, make you taller or…" She ignored, for the time being, the strange, humble way her father was talking and only smiled and nodded eagerly.

Finkelstein seemed relieved. His wrinkled beak contorted to fit a wry smile on it before he gruffly rolled away to the elevator. "Let's go then. I have to warn you, I don't have any more brown hair so if you want longer hair, you'll have to settle for red."

Of course, Sally didn't mind. She happily lay down on the metal slab, watched as Igor came up to her with scissors and a needle and some thread and waited patiently as her dad pushed Igor away, shouted at him for a bit, and snatched the materials out of Igor's slack grasp.

The doctor rolled up to her and attempted to soothingly croon out a, "Now, I suggest you relax and go to sleep…"

* * *

Jack stared for a few seconds at Oogie, who had been staring at some ambiguous point for a while now. The Boogeyman looked as if he had been struck by a sudden idea or gained enlightenment through an epiphany or something. His expression was a little funny and Jack would have laughed only it wasn't very polite to and so he settled for coughing. Oogie continued staring off somewhere so the skeleton finally said, "Hello?"

Oogie finally snapped out of whatever he just had. He stared at Jack, jumped back as if he was surprised that the boy had been standing so close to him for several minutes, and gruffly replied, "What?"

"Well…you were just standing there…is something wrong?"

"No, nothin'. Jus' thought of something." In fact, he had just remembered a tiny name scrawled on his list back home that had yet to be crossed out. Dr. Finkelstein…

He had been planning something of course, but there had been other stuff to do. Places to go. Almost-friends to hang out with.

"Hey, d'ya have any ideas what t' do now?" He almost sounded hopeful.

Jack thought ponderously before replying, "No, not really." Oogie leaned back on a handy tree and thought for a while too. He seemed to be debating something.

"Okay, let's go to that stupid beak-guy's place," he said, reaching a decision.

"Why?" Oogie looked at Jack's innocent skull and realized if he said anything now, the dammed judicious skeleton would probably try to give him second thoughts. So instead, he just returned his usual sinister grin.

"Jus' wait and see."

* * *

After a few minutes evaluation, the Mayor decided that the day wasn't that bad. Halloween was still around the corner, of course, but besides the stress, everything was okay. The rehearsals were getting better, nothing important blew up yet, and there was no sign of trouble so far.

Of course, as soon as the Mayor thought this, Trouble sniffed the air and spread its figurative wings and flew towards the unsuspecting Mayor, trailed closely behind by Irony and Coincidence.

As he strolled around Halloween Town, hoping to calm himself down (not the best way of calming down since this _is_ Halloween Town we're talking about), he passed Oogie and Jack. That wasn't odd in itself, as the two did hang out together often (to the Mayor's increasing dismay), but this time they carried thick, strong ropes (the kind that gave you rope-burns if you even thought of sliding down them) with hefty grappling hooks.

They noticed him staring at them and stared back. The Mayor, realizing that now he was supposed to be doing something Mayor-ly (meaning he should probably ask why two boys were walking around with grappling hooks), straightened up and tried to look serious. "Now what are – "

"Nothin'!" There was more staring as Oogie slowly realized that shouting 'nothing' was exactly the kind of thing that someone would get suspicious of. He dumped his grappling hook into Jack's arms (the skeleton fell backwards from the added weight) and stalked up to the Mayor as casually, but creepily, as he could. "Nothing," he repeated, this time with a very nonchalant tone. "Only some project." He slapped an arm around the poor Mayor's shoulders in a deceivingly friendly way.

The Mayor was now shaking. "Wi-with…grappling hooks…?"

"…Yeah, but y'have my word that it's a _harmless_ project with _harmless_ grappling hooks that will be used…harmlessly."

The Mayor shook some more and thought about his available replies. He immediately decided that it wasn't a good idea to point out that Oogie's word was more worthless than moody teenagers. "…But…"

Oogie decided to make use of Jack's reputation. "D'ya really think if I was gonna do anything horrible, Jack would be here helping me?" He pointed to the boy who was still struggling under the heavy ropes. "He's not _that_ bad, is he?"

"No," the pale face of the Mayor murmured. Despite last night's escapade, he knew, as did everybody else, that Jack was still as nice as ever. Just because he broke one rule in his lifetime of general un-rule-breaking-ness, doesn't automatically make him a delinquent.

Oogie grinned and patted the Mayor's back in an amiable fashion. "Glad you see it my way. Now, go ahead and do…whatever it was you were doin' and forget 'bout us…" The Mayor hastily complied, as that was the smart thing to do at the moment.

Oogie watched the conical man scuttle out of sight before finally helping Jack with his onerous load and both of them continued stumbling towards Dr. Finkelstein's house.

* * *

Okay, maybe he didn't think this all the way through.

Oogie and Jack were now somewhere to the side of the Finkelstein house. It loomed menacingly over them (but then again, everything in Halloween Town loomed menacingly). The wall was dilapidated and there were many tantalizing holds for grappling hooks to…well, grapple on to, but none of them could throw it high enough to reach all the way to the top, on the round, open window that was most likely the attic.

"Crap," the malicious boy sighed. He would have to try this again later, maybe, when he had some idea of how to get up there.

Zero barked to let the two know he was there, and gave Jack a glare that quite plainly said, 'You didn't feed me yet.'

"Oh, Zero, you're here!" Jack grinned, apparently not noticing the sour expression on the ghost's face. The skeleton obliviously petted the dog. Zero put up with this because Jack didn't give him treats if he bit people, and the skeleton boy cleverly put the bags of treats inside one of those damn ghost barriers.

"Oh great, it's here," Oogie groaned, but didn't do anything besides lean against the wall and watch Jack fool around with his stupid dog. The skeleton took out some kind of biscuit that was shaped like a bone and threw it upwards so that Zero had to fly up and catch it in midair.

It was during all this boring watching that Oogie suddenly figured out a plan.

"Hey, get that thing t'hold this," he commanded, indicating the grappling hook. Jack stared at him oddly for a while, but still held out the hook for the ghost dog to grip in his jaws. "Now," Oogie continued, "get it t' fly up t' that open window and tie it 'round something sturdy." This took a little bribing, for although Zero needed no incentive to bite something, he simply refused to be a courier. After an offer of almost the rest of the bag of biscuits, Zero finally followed the orders and zipped upwards quickly as Oogie still held the other end.

As soon as the dog came back down (and immediately stuck his face in the bag of biscuits), Oogie tugged on the hanging rope. The hook didn't come flying back down on his head, so he started climbing. He could hear Jack climbing behind him.

Oogie soon realized that he didn't think about _another_ problem. He became aware of this as soon as his buggy arms started crying with pain (literally. The bugs weren't exactly used to a lot of strenuous work like climbing up a wall.). Luckily, he managed to endure and clamored into the attic, exhausted, but feeling accomplished. Jack jumped in too, and together, they sank to the floor and rested for a while, leaning against the wall.

It took a few minutes before Oogie realized that they had not been leaning against the wall. It was stone, but it was different…

The boy looked up and started to curse that damn ghost dog.

The large – no, _gargantuan_ gargoyle glared down at him with a fiery red light. It didn't seem too amused about the grappling hook wrapped around its leg.

Oogie hastily stood up and quickly strode backwards, away from the stone beast. Jack stood up, and simply stared.

"Who…are you…?" grumbled the gargoyle. It said these words slowly, as if it was carefully choosing each individual one in its head. The gravelly voice, Oogie noted nervously, was much louder than the one that came out that not-so-golden funnel…

"I'm Jack, and he's Oogie." The skeleton peered up at the unmoving stone face. "Are you…Goyle?" Oogie stared at his almost-friend in surprise. How did he know the name of this thing? The huge gargoyle seemed shocked too, although its expression didn't seem to change.

"That…is the name…the doctor…gave me…" it rumbled. "…You…are a…friend…?"

Oogie strained his memory for a bit. Goyle…Goyle…had Finkelstein actually mentioned Goyle…? No…he just couldn't remember. But he did remember that the doctor did talk about the thing that operated the elevator. How did Jack remember that?!

"Yes, well I think we're friends. It's sort of hard to tell now." Finkelstein was treating him kindly enough, but he still didn't let Jack in anymore.

This answer seemed to be good enough for Goyle, because it hadn't leapt towards them with its mouth aflame or anything. Oogie relaxed a little.

"…What…brings you…here…?" the gargoyle droned. Now that Oogie wasn't apprehensive about the stone beast, he found the gargoyle's way of talking very annoying.

"Well, uh…" The skeleton looked back towards his friend. "Oogie, why _did_ we come here?" Oh that's right, Oogie reflected. He never told Jack why he climbed up the old geezer's house.

"Just t' hang out. Wanted t' see how that elevator moved." Jack seemed to accept this, and the gargoyle was still sitting there, so Oogie inferred that they didn't find it odd at all. "So…speaking of which," the sack of bugs started again, clapping his hands together, "how does that elevator move?"

"…The doctor…told…me…not to…"

"Y' aren't supposed to say?" Oogie finished.

"…Tell…anybody…yes." It took the two boys a few minutes to figure out that the one-eyed gargoyle was finishing his sentence and confirming what Oogie said.

"Oh. But the thing's behind you, right?"

"…Yes…"

"And it isn't that hard t' work the thing, right?"

"…No…"

"'Kay then." Oogie tried to peer behind Goyle, but the stone beast was too wide. "So…d'ya wanna take a break or something?" God, that was stupid. The thing must've figured out what he wanted to do by now!

But no, Goyle didn't seem to notice anything. It rumbled a bit, then stiffly replied, "…I…am not…allowed…"

"To take breaks?"

"…to take….breaks…but…

"But…?" Oogie prompted, wishing that the stupid rock would go faster. Jack frowned at him for a bit. It was impolite to rush someone, even if he was going very slowly.

"…if you…want…we can…talk…"

Oogie wasn't delighted by this suggestion, as he felt that if he tried holding a conversation with the gargoyle, he would die of boredom. Jack, however, was. "That sounds nice," he chirruped. "What do you do up here besides pulling the elevator up and down? Do you read anything? Do you have any hobbies?"

"…….I…just…move the…elevator…I have…never…read…I…"

"God dammit!" Oogie roared with impatience. "Can't you just nod or shake your head?!"

"…sit…and watch…out the…window…yesterday I saw…a rooster…it was…very…thin…the…sunrise is…very…nice…the musicians…played…outside…this morning…it was lo…vely…"

"It even drags out words…" Oogie muttered.

"…No…I cannot…move…my head…very…well…please…….don't interrupt…me…."

"_I asked that 'bout two minutes ago!_" This was ridiculous. How slowly can this thing talk?! How could Jack just stand there?! How can he stand it!?

"Oh, do you like music? I like orchestral music myself. I've never played an instrument, though."

At least that red eye isn't watching me anymore, thought Oogie. Although the gargoyle never moved its head, he could somehow tell that its attention was all on Jack and their conversation. None of it was on him. So, this was his chance, wasn't it?

He heard Goyle drone, "Music….is….very nice…I…would like…to…play…an instrument…someday…" as he edged around it without attracting its attention. Jack didn't seem to notice either. How could he be so preoccupied by that conversation?

Behind the large, stone beast, there was a very thick rope attached to a pulley that looked worryingly rusty and loose. ("I'm sure you can play something, like a tuba.") The rope, however, was very strong and sturdy-looking, and it ran down into a hole in the stone floor, and out of sight. It wasn't a very large hole, only big enough to allow the rope to go up and over the pulley. ("….I…like…the guitar…") There was a funnel elevated by a tall fork, which Oogie assumed was used to listen to orders and to breathe 'Yes, sir' into. There was also a lever near the hole, which Oogie assumed was the brake, to prevent the elevator from falling when it wasn't in motion. ("…There were…three…birds…on the…window…two days…ago…" "They should be migrating by now.")

This would definitely be easy. The lever didn't even have a lock on it. All he had to do was sit and wait and try not to listen to the conversation so that all his bugs wouldn't commit suicide simultaneously.

It was very hard. The only thing that kept him awake and alert was the thought that the old, crazy, scientist _had_ to use the elevator some time.

Finally, when the conversation had suddenly skipped to giant tofu heads and Oogie was wondering how long it would take for him to lose consciousness if he started banging his head on the wall, he heard something faint from the funnel near the lever. It sort of sounded like the opening of elevator doors. And when he ignored the boring conversation behind him, it sounded like somebody was fumbling with an almost-gold funnel.

Oogie grinned maliciously. It wasn't very good proof, hardly proof at all, in fact, but it was good enough for him. He was always a bit of a gambler, anyways. He pulled the lever and the rope, no longer restrained, succumbed to gravity. The elevator fell. Oogie started laughing manically, happy of a job well done, but stopped once he realized that the scream coming out of the funnel wasn't Finkelstein's.

It was Sally's.


	9. Off on a Quest

He had honestly enjoyed the scream, and hated himself bitterly for it.

He had even delighted in Finkelstein's cry of outrage, which even triggered a little fear in Goyle, even if Finkelstein was supposed to be the one at the bottom of that elevator shaft.

It shouldn't have turned out that way. It was all wrong.

Jack was staring at him. He didn't know what with, for he didn't dare turn around to face him, but he guessed that it some of the stare was composed of disappointment.

"Oogie…"

Then a trapdoor slammed open and Finkelstein, being held up by Igor, poked his head through it. "YOU!" he exclaimed angrily, but was merely pushed aside and off the stairway that led to the attic. Oogie ran down the creaking wooden steps and disappeared around the corner.

As Igor helped Dr. Finkelstein up again, Jack bounded down the steps as well. "Oogie! Wait!"

They ran out the door, Jack pleading with Oogie to stop, and as they entered the graveyard, there was a sound as if somewhere near Finkelstein's house, a lot of stone was being smashed onto the ground. Jack hesitated, but continued after the brown blob in front of him. Finally, with his much longer legs, he caught up with Oogie and forcibly spun him around. Oogie winced, expecting to see another angry face, but Jack only looked confused and sad.

"…Why did you do that…?"

There was only an uncomfortable silence.

"…Oogie, please…just tell me…"

"I don't have t' tell you anything."

"But we're friends…if you tell me, maybe I could help…"

"Shut up!" Oogie shoved Jack away. "We're NOT friends! I've always hated you! Everybody loves you! _Everybody_! Because they think you're scary! But they hate me for the exact same thing! It's unfair! You're naïve! Annoying! _Stupid_! You can't help me! You're not even that scary! Have you ever been truly feared like me, instead of adored by soft-headed women?!" Then he turned and ran all the way back to his home. Jack just watched him until he couldn't see his back anymore. It didn't seem right to chase him again. The skeleton walked home with some troubling thoughts weighing his mind.

* * *

The next few days were uneventful. Oogie started to work on his home, because working kept his mind off of Sally and Jack. When it was nice and roomy, he started to furnish it, adding a huge roulette wheel in the middle and giant Kings. Anything that reminded him of elevators was thrown out. He threw out one of Zero's dog collar that Jack accidentally left behind, but kept the needle and thread that Sally lent him, even though looking at them made him depressed.

Over time, he worked on the unfinished treehouse as well. He hung up rusty weapons and spider webs. He kept the rickety cage-elevator that Jack made because, no matter what Oogie said, he had fun. He didn't want to completely forget the times he had with his friends, nor did he want to forget about his mistake.

He tried to work almost the whole day, because as soon as he tried to go to sleep, he would start to think of Sally again and his feeling of elation at her scream, and about how he didn't _choose_ to be The Boogeyman, nor did he choose to love another person's fear. He wanted to blame someone else, but he didn't know who, and so he just kept working.

Jack, although even more distracted than usual, managed to get to rehearsals, which put the Mayor in a considerably better mood.

Finally, Halloween rolled around. There was a frantic scramble to decorate and fix whatever might be wrong. The Mayor was in the middle of directing where a giant Jack-o-Lantern should go when Jack tapped his shoulder.

"Yes?" blared the Mayor's voice through his megaphone. Jack gently pushed it away from his mouth.

"Um…I need to say something…" The Mayor suddenly had a Bad Feeling in his gut, but he forced a grinning face. "I think I need to leave." His forced face spun away.

"What!? You're leaving!?" the Mayor shouted, now pale and sobbing. His voice was almost as loud as it was with the megaphone. "Jack! You can't do this to me! Halloween is _today_! We've already rehearsed for a year for this! You can't leave! I won't let you! You have to stay!"

All the shouting attracted everybody else, and soon, there was an even louder clamor for Jack to stay. It took a few minutes for the skeleton to calm everybody down and say that he wasn't going to leave _now_, but after Halloween.

This lasted until somebody voiced their worry that Jack would not come for the coming Halloweens, and then everybody started up again, saying how they needed him, that it wouldn't be Halloween without him, that he was the scariest one out of them, even if he was still quite young, and so he assured them all that he would come back for the month of October.

Now they were satisfied. The crowd dispersed, going back to doing their various jobs, but the Mayor grabbed Jack's arm before he left.

"Why?" he asked, staring up from below his ridiculously tall hat.

"Because…I need to learn something. And I can't do that here." And the tall skeleton pulled himself away to help someone with some barbed wire. The Mayor wanted to ask some more questions, or maybe even convince Jack to stay, but instead put on a happy face and made more orders through his megaphone.

* * *

"But…but it's Halloween!"

"No means no, Sally! You will have to stay home!"

"It's the most important day of the year, dad! I can't miss it!"

More like you want to see Jack, thought Finkelstein, but he put that thought aside. "Your safety is more important than your entertainment."

"I'm fine. It's not like I'm going to fall apart as soon as I walk outside! Dad, pleeeease?"

Finkelstein sighed and he rubbed his forehead as if he had a migraine, but remained steadfast. Sally would not go outside. Absolutely not.

She didn't push the matter any further and walked up to her room, trying to stomp on the steps to show how angry she was but also show how mature she was, keeping it to herself instead of throwing a tantrum.

Her room was bare as always. Only now did she feel that it was so boring. Counting the stones that made up her room was boring. Sowing was boring. Reading was boring. Books could never replace experiences. She found that she didn't want to read about how and why sodium reacted in water; she wanted to throw a big chunk in and see for herself. There must have been so many things she had only read or heard about, but never actually seen! The world wasn't just confined to Halloween Town and its gossip and now Sally wanted to see the rest of it. But her dad wouldn't even let her out to celebrate Halloween!

For the first time, Sally plotted something quite reckless.

Dr. Finkelstein was also staying inside for Halloween. He wasn't an unfair man. He felt that if Sally couldn't go out and enjoy the festivities, then he couldn't. So he planned to spend Halloween night thinking up a better elevator.

Sally wandered around a little, but he didn't think that was odd. A girl should be able to walk around her own house, after all. She seemed to have lit a candle because he could see one out of the corner of his eye. It wasn't bothersome, so he just continued working. Strangely, as he did so, he felt sleepier and sleepier…

There was a 'thunk!' when Finkelstein's head hit the table. Sally peered out from behind a wall, her mouth and nose covered with thick cloth, and smiled at her success. As she had thought, burning Deadly Nightshade had the same effect as sprinkling it in soup. She pinched out the candle, so to not accidentally give the old doctor a deadly dose, and carefully closed his head again (it had opened when he fell forward). She also draped a blanket around him and left a note that simply said 'Sorry,' because though she was being quite reckless, she wasn't being quite impolite.

Knowing that Igor would probably stop her from going out, Sally distracted him with a whole box of doggy treats and slipped out the door quietly while the short man happily snarfed the box empty. And she was out! Free! In time for the big event!

Sally immediately searched for Jack, hoping to find him before it all started.

* * *

"…_and when you turn around, we'll be there  
clawed hands outstretched, tangled in your hair  
and you'll try to run but it's no use  
for on this moonless night…_

_Nowhere to run! Nowhere to hide!  
Ghouls and goblins everywhere in sight!  
No place is safe! Nothing confined!  
Stay still and…we'll…send…you…a horribly…heart-stopping…_

_FRIGHT!"_

There was a moment of silence as Jack Skellington jumped out of seemingly nowhere, eyes somehow alight with fire, bony hands somehow clawed and sharp. He cackled long and hard, and his usually kind complexion was grotesquely contorted into a malicious, sadistic grin. Halloween always made the others wonder if they really, truly and deeply, knew Jack. And then afterwards, he transformed back into the affable skeleton and everybody forgot that thought. Of course Jack's nice! He wouldn't be Jack if he wasn't! He couldn't be hiding anything!

Everybody let out the breath they were holding and cheered for Jack, for each other, and for another successful Halloween. "That was great!" "How'd he do that flaming eye thing?" "It wouldn't be scary if he told you, idiot." "I finally got that note right!"

As they all officially named it The Best Halloween Yet, Jack slipped away. Nobody seemed to notice.

Zero did. The dog caught up with him at the graveyard, trying to impatiently remind the skeleton that he wanted to eat.

"Oh, Zero. Don't make a loud noise. I don't want to let everybody go to all the trouble to throw a huge, tearful goodbye when I leave."

Zero expressed surprise at this newfound fact. The Boy Made Of Bones was leaving? Nobody told him! Who was going to feed him now?!

Jack easily misunderstood Zero's restlessness, as he tends to misunderstand many things. "If you want, you can come with me."

Zero sulked because that's not what he wanted at all but there was no way he could let the daft, thick-skulled boy know without a large diagram or something. The ghost dog trailed silently behind Jack, knowing that eventually, he would remember.

Jack came to the door that Oogie had shown them months ago. The snarling demon statue was the same, although some moss had apparently tried to grow on it (but, like the rest of the plants, died from the atmosphere). As a result, it looked like a young, brown-haired Chia Pet.

As Jack was staring at this, someone snuck up behind him and touched his shoulder. He jumped, startled, but turned around slowly, unafraid, as things sneaking up behind you are probably the least scary things in Halloween Town. (It's the things jumping in front of you that you have to look out for.)

It was Sally, and she was looking as worried as usual, but she looked much different than when Jack saw her last. For one thing, she was taller.

"Growth spurt?" the skeleton boy started, feeling that the silence had gone on long enough.

"Dad decided that six years was long enough to keep me the same size."

"Ah," Jack said, and the conversation perished.

Sally fiddled with her fingers until it seemed that they would fall off. She wanted to say _something _(along the lines of, 'Take me with you!'), but all that recklessness that hat propelled her out the house seemed to have vanished and she was the quiet, shy Sally again. "So you're leaving," she finally said.

"Yes," Jack affirmed for about the fourth time.

"I see." This moment would be perfect for a breeze to blow by, carrying pink petals with it, but as this is Halloween Town, nothing of the sort happened. (There are no sakura trees in Halloween Town anyways; if there are, then they look no different than the other, very remarkably dead, trees.) "…May I come with you?"

"Huh? Well…um…" From Jack's reaction, Sally immediately knew she wasn't going anywhere.

"It's something you have to do yourself…?"

"Kind of. I think I'm trying to prove a point…to Oogie…"

Sally looked downwards at the mention of the name. It wasn't that she hated the crass bag of bugs; it was simply because the memory of suddenly falling still made her cringe. "Well, when everything is normal again, I want to join you."

Jack grinned softly. "Sure. We'll all go on a trip after all this is over." His grin widened at the thought of being together with just the only two who had ever treated him normally instead of kissing the ground at his feet. The two waved goodbye, and then Jack and Zero disappeared into the stone monument.

Sally stood there long after the stone doors closed and she realized that she was going to be in _so_ much trouble when Dr. Finkelstein woke up.

* * *

Hello. I thought that it would ruin the mood if I complained about this chapter at the beginning, but not so much here, so here I am! First of all, I'd like to say I'm not very good at writing serious stuff. This thing reminds me of Narm. Also, it's shorter than my other chapters. Garblegarblegook.

But don't let that hold you back from reviewing!


	10. The Spread of his Fame

Finally, I've finished this! This chapter is kinda short, which I'm rather disappointed in, so sorry 'bout that. There should be about two more chapters to go, which I'll hopefully finish soon.

* * *

**_Spreading His Name_**

He was walking alone around town, like he had done not too long ago.

Billy was coming back from the police department. He wasn't in trouble or anything, he just simply took to visiting there once in a while. Maybe he hoped to hang around with that police officer and watch him do cool things and possibly have some of his cool-ness rub off onto him. Unfortunately, nothing interesting had happened yet, and Billy quickly realized that whatever awesomeness the police officer had, it wouldn't somehow transfer to him just by hanging out together. (The evidence for this was Knobbs and Teal and Collins.)

As the boy mused about how to be cool and how he really shouldn't be wandering around so late anymore, there was a sudden chill in the air. And, even though he thought it very cliché, he could feel somebody giving his neck a cold stare. Hands shaking, Billy walked faster, but no. Now he could hear the person behind him easily keeping up. In fact, it sounded like the person trailing him was _catching up_.

Billy turned the corner suddenly, hoping to shake off this stalker, but it was too late. A clammy hand caught his shoulder and the stranger pulled himself closer and he could feel a chilly breath near his ear and he could hear the rattle of the man's teeth as he said, _"Your Time Has Come."_

He screamed. It was embarrassing, but he screamed loudly and struggled out of that cold grasp and turned to see his attacker, who, as he had imagined, was wearing a black, hooded cloak and a long, sharp scythe, and Death was putting down his hood to reveal his face and –

"Gotcha."

Mr. Unlucky was giving him that happy, nothing-is-wrong-here grin.

Billy grabbed at his chest, and yes, his heart was still pounding so fast, it could probably jump out and flop about on the ground like a fish. "Holy crap," he breathed out. "Please don't do that! I thought I was gonna di – I mean, that really scare – I mean...uh…please don't do that." The officer had explained him all about these doors on these trees leading to holiday worlds or something like that. It sounded crazy, and Billy wasn't sure whether he believed it or not. He wasn't even sure how the officer knew himself. But so far, it was the most plausible explanation he had. Because it was the _only_ explanation he had.

Mr. Unlucky's smile faltered. "You don't like to be scared?"

"Yeah," Billy said, averting his eyes from the skeleton. The officer had also told him how much fun they thought scaring was. "Most people here don't, actually. Only when they're in haunted houses or watching scary movies or something like that."

"Hm. Really?" Because Billy had turned away, he didn't see how Jack's grin widened or the way his eye sockets somehow glittered for a second.

"Yeah. Some people pay to go through a haunted house, and sometimes there's a creepy one that kids keep daring people to go into. And there're people who are hired to act like monsters or act scared for a film. I don't really get it though…hey, uh, by the way, can you tell me your actual name…? It's kinda weird to keep calling you 'Mr. Unlucky.'"

"I like it," the skeleton commented. "But if you don't want to call me that…then my name is Jack."

Billy blinked. That was an amazingly…normal name. He had several classmates named Jack. A crooked smile grew on the boy's face as it dawned on him that this creepy, monstrous figure was rather normal.

"Skellington. Jack Skellington." Billy's smile dropped.

"Okay…uh…Jack. Um," said Billy, looking around wildly for some other topic of conversation they could start. "Um…uh…is…that a…tissue floating around your legs…?"

"What?" Billy stared at the floating thing some more and realized that there were holes for eyes and a…glowing pumpkin nose…if it was a nose. It was glaring up at him, glaring at everything else, and rotating nervously around Jack's spindly legs. "Oh, that's my dog, Zero."

"…It's a ghost…"

"Yes," said Jack with the polite tone that people use when someone is being ridiculously obvious. "For some reason, some people call him Homicidal Maniac." Billy chuckled nervously, as if unsure whether he was joking or not. "So what about these haunted houses? Do you have one here?"

"If you're thinking of scaring a few kids, I think it's too late now…or not," Billy hastily added, seeing Jack's disappointed expression. "I mean, it's not midnight yet, I think. Some kids might've taken a dare to go to that old Sinistham house. It's creepy, it's abandoned, it's dangerous…so yeah, some kids go there every year."

"Great! Sounds perfect! Do you mind showing me where it is?"

* * *

This was weird. They just walked underground, into a grave/crypt thing, then came out the other end into some other place. This place was different. It looked different…it smelled different…yet, it seemed familiar. Zero wound around the skeleton's legs again. What happened to the smell of burning candles and fear and candy? The candy smell was still there, but this oddly familiar place didn't have that distinctively sinister smell.

The ghost dog trailed behind the two as they walked, looking around and trying to crank out at least some tidbit of memories long ago, when he had been alive.

And then things got _really _strange. Suddenly, there was some kind of light shining on Zero, even though there wasn't a streetlight above him, and he couldn't move, and it was steadily getting blinding, and the skeleton and the boy didn't seem to notice it or the fact that he had stopped following them, and then all he could see was white and there was a voice saying his name, only it wasn't his name, but a name he might have been called long ago…

"Ah, good, you've finally come. I'm sorry we couldn't pick you up sooner, but your death was…odd. No dog has ever been bitten by a werewolf before. You were immediately put out of our jurisdiction."

For some reason, he was standing on _clouds_. And he was actually _standing_. With _legs_. And he had _hair_.

"Of course, having spent such a long time as a ghost, it would be hard to remember what your living form had looked like. Allow me to be the first angel to welcome you to…Heaven."

The clouds were so fluffy, and Zero bounced on them experimentally with his new (well, old) legs. The angel dog continued her introduction. "Of course, all dogs, being naturally loyal, go to Heaven. There is no need for us to check your records. You can fly in Heaven. You can, but do not need to, eat in Heaven…"

The clouds were so thick, Zero couldn't see through them to the ground. It was interesting, since it had been a cloudless night. And was all the light up here really coming from the sun? And what was that smell? "Heaven, in short, is paradise. We can initiate you immediately with your own halo and living space…"

Zero finally started paying attention to the angel dog, who was one of those perfectly groomed, long-haired dogs. A penetrating light shone from her halo, and she looked on him with kind eyes. "And then I can show you around the place. Now if you will please follow me…" The angel dog gestured towards the tall, intricately decorated, golden gates, which opened by itself smoothly. More light, if that was possible, shone from it and radiated a feeling of pleasant, carefree days…

Yet, he continued standing where he was. The angel floated towards the gates a little before landing and turning back. "Please follow me," she repeated.

There was all this free space to run around in, and it seemed the clouds were pretty good for digging. This Heaven place made him feel so _light_…but then again, he had felt like that as a ghost. Looking around again, Zero could see that, yes, there was a limit to the clouds here. The endless fields, the place without an edge, were probably through those gates.

Zero smirked at the angel and said, "Screw you, bitch." While she was still looking suitably surprised, he jumped off the edge of Heaven.

It was a terribly long fall. He could feel his outer layer being stripped away, like a hologram or something, as he became a ghost again. His legs swam in the air as they disappeared, trying to gain some unseen purchase. And finally, something canceled out and Zero was floating lazily again. Alright, now where was that walking heap of bones…

Well, he had to admit that the bitch was right. Dogs were just naturally loyal.

"Ah, there you are Zero!" Ah yes, and there was that all-too-familiar Halloween Town smell. "I was a little worried when you weren't with us a while ago…now what were you doing out here?"

"It can talk too?" said the human boy rather apprehensively.

"No, of course not. Just a rhetorical question. Well, Zero, we'll be living in a great place for a few weeks. It has cobwebs and the basement is dank. Sometimes it drizzles down there."

"Hey, do you need to eat? Just wondering, 'cause, I mean, I wouldn't want you to die. Again. Or whatever it is you do."

"Oh, I'm sure there will be plenty of spiders in that house." Zero was quite amused to note that the boy paled very visibly then and excused himself as Jack led him back to the now-haunted house.

* * *

The old Sinistham Manor was now well-known in the town, and for a few weeks, children trying to prove bravery or protect pride would go there. Billy enjoyed a little fame for being the only one who never ran out screaming (though he did scream a lot, he managed to suppress those flight urges long enough to at least have interesting conversations with Jack). One night, the skeleton asked him for some maps, and the next, he left, promising to visit someday. It seemed a shame for the manor to lose its popularity, and so Billy found himself going there every day to set up strings and traps, the kind of things that opened doors seemingly by themselves and swooped 'ghosts' down towards unsuspecting visitors. Of course, it could never replace Jack, but luckily it was good enough for the jittery visitors.

Jack travelled across the Americas, hiding in rotting houses and scaring anybody who came in. (Language was not all that important – 'Boo' is universal.) And of course, he always made it back to town in time for Halloween. This was partly thanks to Zero, who kept sniffing out secret passageways to random areas in Halloween Town. As the pair found more and more, Jack couldn't help but wonder how nobody ever wandered in to town.

Every Halloween, he arrived at sunrise, greeted enthusiastically by the townspeople. When he had the time, he would meet with Sally and they would walk to the large, crooked tree. Conversations went on like this: "Hello, Oogie. I know you're in there. Won't you come out this year? No? Alright then. This time, I went to an island called Hawaii, or maybe it was part of Hawaii, and England. I think I'm quite well-known in both places now. There're about four woods in England that nobody goes into, and an old, decrepit hut that the Hawaiians avoid. The weather was completely different in those places. Hawaii was warm and sunny and there were funny-looking trees there. England was rainy and there were nice, dark skies, but the trees also looked weird there. There aren't a lot of twisted, dead trees, really, and the flowers are colorful." And so on.

These one-sided conversations sometimes went on for hours, and though the tree never showed signs of life, Jack kept at it before leaving with Sally, who was more willing to participate in conversation. She would tell him what had been going on while he was away, and he would share worries that he wouldn't be able to learn the whole routine by the time he was expected to perform. Of course, somehow, he managed.

It happened one night, while Jack was haunting an abandoned Shaolin temple in China. He realized that, after years and years of doing it continuously, scaring was _boring_. It was too easy now. He could tell by looking at a person when they entered whether it would take only a short pop out of the closet and a loud 'Boo,' or it would take small things to incite paranoia before the big finish. Sometimes, he found himself idly analyzing the other Halloween Town citizens. The Mayor, he knew, was the person who entered last, who twitched the flashlight everywhere. The werewolves were mostly the leaders who would force everybody else to stay and wave off warnings of 'I think that's a bad idea.' The vampires were mostly the stoic types who never let anything startle them, and usually criticized the methods.

Scaring had become…a job.

…Well, it was a job he had to do. Until he convince Oogie that he could understand, that they could talk, until things could go back to normal…

There was a sound of a very timid Chinese kid wriggling through the temple doors.

Time to work.

* * *

Hurray for explanatory chapters, eh? The whole 'Heaven' scene seems out of place to me...well, please review.


	11. Lock, Shock, and Barrel

Phew, another chapter done. This is almost done, people!

* * *

_**Slavery**_

It was another horrible (in a good way) Halloween. The crows were coughing, the sky was cloudy, and Halloween Town was full of partying creatures.

But there were some who had to put aside Halloween for the time being to take part in a very important debate.

"Hey, you took what I wanted! I wanted that!"

"Too bad, I got it first. So it's _mine_!"

"You can just take another one from the bowl, can't you? Please move, I wanna get something too…"

The girl in the witch costume pushed the whiny mummy boy off the stairs before turning back to the boy in the devil costume. "You got the last one! Hand it over!"

"Hey, I'm sure you have plenty of these! You probably grabbed them with your _fat_ hands, you _hog_!"

"I'm not fat!"

"Are too!" Before the two could start pushing each other off the stairs, they noticed a young boy walking by with a tantalizingly full sack, lollipop in one hand, skeleton mask in the other.

Lock and Shock both considered themselves the Bosses of the Children, which was probably one of the many reasons they disagreed with each other. Whenever the two met, there was sure to be a fight about something shallow and stupid, or a bet made, or a dare. There had been so many contests that nobody knew who was winning anymore. There had been so many dares that it was hard to think up of new ones.

There were only two things they agreed on: That they hated each other's guts and that Barrel was fun to pick on.

In a rare moment of teamwork, Lock snatched away Barrel's mask and while the three-toed kid was distracted, Shock shoved him roughly into the sneering devil boy.

"Hey, kid! Watch it!"

Barrel, the youngest (and thus shortest) kid in town, struggled to grab back his mask. "It wasn't my fault! Shock pushed me!"

"Geez, shorty, you shouldn't blame others for what you did. You should be more careful!"

"But you did! I felt you pushing me!"

"Well, shrimp, if ya can't learn to accept your idiotic mistakes, then we'll just have to _teach_ ya…" With a malicious grin, Lock flung the mask over Barrel, which was then caught by Shock.

"We'll shove you face-first in some humble pie!" As Barrel started towards the witch girl, Lock kicked him so he ended up sprawled on the ground and the two bullies ran away, giggling manically while Barrel stumbled behind them on stubby legs. They taunted him, shouting things like, 'Ooooh, a skeleton, copying Jack, huh?' or 'I suddenly wanna drop this down a well…'

The three children ran a winding path throughout the town, knocking several creatures down and generally being annoying until an irked werewolf chased them to the graveyard.

Barrel managed to steal his mask back, but still remained moody, for he dropped his large bag of candy while he was chased; it had been dragging him down. He could probably go back and get it, but the werewolves were so big. And they had claws. And very sharp teeth. The kid thought it would be detrimental to his health, if not his life, if he went back. So he busied himself with avoiding Lock and Shock as much as he could, which happened to be not very much at all.

"Sheesh, what a bunch of crabs."

"It was your fault, witch. You shouldn't've pushed down the Mayor."

"Well, you shoved that corpse kid in the fountain!"

"Well, you trampled on Harlequin!"

"Well, you threw a bucket through one of the windows!"

"I _kicked_ the bucket! It was an accident!"

"It's _your_ fault we can't get more candy!"

"No, _your _fault!"

"It's _both_ your fault!" Barrel finally shouted, exasperated with the older children's bickering. "If you guys didn't do all that stupid stuff back there, then we wouldn't've been chased out and I wouldn't've lost all my candy and I wouldn't be stuck here with you _jerks_!"

If this was any other story, this outburst would have shocked the bullies into submission and there may have been a tearful moment where enemies made up and became friends. But it's not. Instead, Lock and Shock started chasing Barrel around the graveyard.

Eventually, the children's energy ran out, and they stopped and rested. Now they were beyond the graveyard, farther out than any other kid had gone. There was a lot of boring, gnarled, uninteresting trees, which was one of the main reasons kids stayed in the more interesting and engaging (and, more importantly, candy-supplying) town.

But this was a clearing in the forest. And one tree just begged for attention. With a creaky bridge and a deep ditch and an old-looking tree house? Who could resist staring?

The trio stared in silence. Magnificent. A horrible work of art. In the good way.

Shock broke the silence. "I dare you to go up there."

"Well, I dare you, too!"

"Just go in, already," grumbled Barrel. His punishment this time was being dragged into the elevator and up to the treehouse.

"Have splinters on yer heels?" asked Lock.

"Yes," Barrel complained.

"Good!" And then they both let go of his arms.

The treehouse creaked. It was old. There were bugs skittering around, and the uneasy feeling that it would all topple if the wind blew at the right place, as well as mysterious mutterings that forced its way to the ear, but managed to keep itself unintelligible. But that wasn't very impressive. What was impressive was the array of _sharp_ weapons in some of the rooms. What was impressive was that the treehouse actually had _rooms_. It was huge. And dangerous. A leg iron fell on Lock's head at one point. But that just added to the excitement.

"Hey! Look at this!" Shock grabbed a double-sided axe much too big for her and swung it around experimentally, embedding it in a nearby chest of drawers.

"This thing looks deadly," giggled Lock as he slammed a javelin into a nearby suit of armor to see what damage was done.

Barrel picked up an outlawed bear trap and had it snap onto the crotch area of a mannequin before laughing immaturely.

The trio was almost immediately unified as they got swept up in the sense of adventure. It was a disappointment when they opened a door only to find a bathroom.

Nothing even remotely sharp. Only a moldy sink and a bathtub.

"Does a treehouse even get plumbing?" Barrel questioned, reaching over to a tap on the tub as Lock and Shock disinterestedly fenced each other with plungers.

When the costumed boy turned the tap, no water came out, which was expected. But a trap door opened underneath the kids, which was entirely _not_ expected. The three fell down a long pipe, landed hard when it suddenly turned at an angle, and slid all the way down to someplace dark. They landed, disoriented, somewhere under the tree. A few seconds later, the tub came down and landed, upside-down, over them.

The trick-or-treaters struggled in the small space before finally pushing it off, and then they let themselves adjust to the dark.

"Barrel," said Shock dangerously. "I'm gonna _kill_ you _so much_…!" But before any killing could be done, bright lights came on, blinding the trio temporarily. There was that insane muttering again, only louder, and it crescendo'ed into harsh laughter, laughter that wound its way through darkness and smashed your jaw like a brick, laughter that made your legs buckle because it whacked them with something unlike a lead pipe, because it was more painful.

Lock, Shock and Barrel found themselves huddling together and backing up, feeling actual fear for the first time. Not the fear found in Halloween Town – real, flight-or-fight fear.

They backed all the way up into something that was definitely not the wall. The wall wasn't that squishy. Or squirmy.

"Visitors!" boomed a deep voice. "Well, well, well! Haha, more unwanted ones!" The voice somehow managed to sound jovial and threatening at the same time. Lock felt a hand (well, he thought it was a hand) on his shoulder. Shock felt something crawling over her feet. "Why don't you have a _seat_?" He must have pressed a switch or something, because suddenly chairs slid out of nowhere, pushed themselves under the children's legs, and strapped them in firmly.

It happened so shockingly fast; it was only when their captor sauntered into their view that they suddenly started struggling against their bonds. A stout man-shaped sack, obviously filled with living things, just stood and grinned, relishing their panic.

"Let us go!" Instead of sounding domineering and authoritative, as Shock had intended, she…whimpered.

The burlap sack man didn't seem to hear her, though. He laughed some more. "Mmm, a devil, a witch, and a skeleton…" There was a pause. They reminded him of something. Something important and fun, years ago…and something bad he'd rather not remember. There was just something about them that made him feel conflicted. Fondness and hate.

"Now, I can't have brats running around my abode, using my own personal stuff without…some kind of payment, shall we say?" The large man sat down in his own chair, and it seemed another switch was pressed because a table slid out smoothly between him and the kids. He leaned over the table, his voice dripping with grease and filth and untrustworthiness.

"…So you're gonna punish us?" Barrel mumbled, staring at his three-toed feet.

"Payment, punishment, same difference, eh?" The three reflexively winced. Sure, they had encountered punishment before, but somehow they knew that whatever punishment this thing had, it would be much crueler than anything they had experienced. The large sack laughed again, obviously enjoying himself. "What are you so tense about? I'm not doin' anything _horrible_, am I? I'm only gonna ask you to play…a game." Maybe it was because of the way he sounded like an unfair lawyer, maybe it was the way that, as he sneered, a snake kept peering out of his mouth and baring its fangs, but the kids felt that this game would be more than that.

From nowhere, the creepy man took out a deck of cards, shuffling it expertly, as if trying to intimidate them (which he did). "Hmmm, what'm I in the mood for…"

And then the torture started.

They played many games. They played for many things, mostly for their lives. They played blackjack on a constantly lowering platform held over an acid tank. They played poker in a cage with a sleeping..._thing_ with sharp teeth. They played Decrepit Maid under a large swinging blade. They even had to guess what number he was thinking and were electrocuted when they got it wrong. But somehow, for some reason, they won just before they would die. And the man was smiling through it all, apparently deriving some kind of genuine, insane enjoyment from their fear of death.

Now they were strapped back in the same three chairs as before waiting anxiously for whatever demented game came next. Their torturer was chuckling when he seemed to have come up with an idea.

"Next one'll be the last, kiddies. You'll be playing for…your freedom."

There was a sudden glimmer of hope. They could get out of this hell! There was a chance!

"Guess my name."

The glimmer snuffed out.

After a long silence devoid of hope, Lock suddenly started kicking, shouting angrily, "You cheater! You liar! Dirty, smelly weasel! You…you…" searching for the worst word he could, Lock finally spat out, "You bastard!"

The devil boy fumed even more when the man cackled jovially. "Nope, not even close! Your guess is done. You're mine, boy…"

Shock seemed to have frozen and didn't say anything when the man's attention was turned to her. "Your turn, girlie…"

"Uh…um…" How was she supposed to get this in one guess?!

"Oh, c'mon, I'm sure you've heard my name before. The town couldn't have _forgotten_ 'bout me…"

"Um…um…"

"Time's up," he said with such finality that the girl slumped in a defeated despair.

Barrel gulped when he finally turned to him. "And you…?"

Silence.

"If you guess this right, you'll go free, you know."

Silence.

"I'll let your little friends go too."

Now he really started sweating. Everything was riding on him.

The young boy's mind raced. He gave away a hint before, when it had been Shock's turn. The adults must've talked about him! And in whispered fear, too! This cruel man would've been talked about with fear, definitely! A name that rode on whispered rumors and was quietly hushed away around children…

Barrel mumbled something, and blanched visibly when the man leaned towards him. "Couldn't quite hear that, kid."

There was a name that fit that description. It was buried somewhere in this memory. "…Buh…the…boogie…the boogeyman…"

Silence.

"Well, kid…that _is_ what I'm known by…" The certain, greasy way he said it stopped the kids from relaxing. "...Certainly not my name, though. A nickname, really. Unfortunately…partially right isn't good enough."

Somehow they knew something like this would happen.

Lock started his enraged shouting again. "You cheater! You coward! Cheap-o! Swindler! Bastard! Bastard, bastard, bastard, BASTARD!"

"Well, kiddies," continued what could only be described as a demon, apparently ignoring the vulgar outburst. "Looks like you'll be my slaves, hm?" A cruel smile here. All three looked away. "Well, I suppose you'll have to know my real name. Oogie Boogie. And I'm gonna assume that you know what a slave is. Now, I'm gonna release those tight bonds, 'cause I think you know what'll happen if you try to run away."

There was a sound of metal unlocking and retreating behind the uncomfortable chairs. The three kids kept sitting unhappily, waiting for the blood to start running through their arms again.

"Now let's see…I hung you over lava…almost fed you to a chimera…ah yes, used your blood to feed the bats. A lot of blood." It seemed The Boogeyman suddenly transformed. He was suddenly muttering about 'lightheadedness' and 'tired' and, to immense surprise, lumbered out of the light and came back with several bowls of soup.

The kids were so baffled, they stared wide-eyed at their ex-tormenter. He easily noticed this. "What? Ya think it's poisoned or something?" He seized a bowl, scooped up some soup, and gulped it down. "There. Nothin'. Eat. Can't have weak slaves. Take a tour of the place or somethin'. Go home. Make excuses for yer injuries. Come back tomorrow. I'm going to sleep." And he walked away, out of sight.

The kids stared at where he had stood only moments before, sneering at them, then simultaneously looked at the soup. Though young, they did understand something. It was much safer to be a slave than a prisoner. As long as they did as he said, there would be no more games. And, though completely unbelievable, he would take care of them, though it seemed only for the reason of keeping his slaves alive and strong. They had certainly gotten into a horrible (in a bad way) situation. But there would be no more torture.

The trio exchanged glances and silently shook hands, as if making a deal to get along (kinda). They were now co-workers. Kinda funny. They grinned awkwardly at each other, drank some soup (who knew what would happen if they didn't), grudgingly admitted it was actually good, and climbed a ladder back to the treehouse.

As soon as they took a silent elevator ride down to ground level, they ran. They ran as fast as they could, away from the tree, away from the horrible lair under the ground. It was satisfying. It gave elation, even though they knew they would have to come back the next day. They ran all the way back to town and all the way back to home.

* * *

As they had realized, being a slave wasn't bad. Oogie sometimes even seemed to forget they were there. (In fact, the second time they came, he said drowsily, "Who the hell're you?") Mostly he snapped at them to take care of the treehouse, dusting and so on. Sometimes he seemed more like a gruff, domineering uncle. Sometimes he was insanely sadistic. Those times, they would have to quickly get out of sight, or he would 'gamble' with them again, though it was never as bad as that firs day. Sometimes he was just plain insane. Often they found him muttering to himself. It was always something along the lines of, "Not my fault," or "Couldn't help it." Of course, the children were immensely curious. But they didn't want a death wish, so they refrained from prying.

Not that being a slave was good either. The trio couldn't help but note with some envy how other children were normal. On the daily journey to the crooked tree, other children would play and do other normal things. Seeing that left a bitter taste in the mouth.

Once they found a list. It was long. It had names on it, all of them crossed out. Some names they recognized, some they didn't. Though they had a vague idea what it was, Shock decided to ask what the list was for.

Oogie snatched the list and peered at it, as if trying to remember, then glared at them. "It's a list of people. All of 'em are crossed out 'cause I finished some kinda revenge on 'em." He pointed the bottom of the list out to the children. "If ya can't tell, getting on this list is the worst idea you'll ever have." The children looked again at the names they didn't recognize and thought it might be the last idea they'd ever have too.

There was also something that had been hastily erased at the bottom, but the kids instinctively knew this was a topic not to comment on.

* * *

"You know something," said Lock randomly as they rested. "This is all that damn wolf's fault." Shock agreed quickly because she needed someone to blame too. Barrel agreed quickly because if he voiced his real opinion, there would be a two-to-one fight.

"Yeah! If he wasn't in such a snitch, we wouldn't've ended up here!"

"Stuck with the worst boss ever."

"And ugly," giggled Lock.

"And smelly. Like a fresh grave."

"And fat."

"He's insane, too."

"Oh, I'm so flattered."

Ah, crap.

The trio looked upwards, meeting the eyes of The Boogeyman. They weren't expecting him at all. After all, he had never come up in the treehouse before. He raised a hypothetical eyebrow. "So, you don't like my management?"

"Ah," stuttered Shock.

"Of course not! We didn't say that!" said Lock.

"They were all compliments," finished Barrel.

"Even the fat comment?"

Ah, crap.

"So you don't like working for me? There are a lot of benefits, you know. You aren't slowly dying right now, for one." The large sack of bugs said this dangerously, as if that fact may change soon. The children stared at him carefully as he slowly made his way to a weapon-laden wall. When he hefted up one of the large axes, there was a fleeting moment of dread where the kids were certain he was going to behead them. But instead, he tested the weight for a few minutes and tossed it carelessly in front of the kids, where it embedded itself upright in the wood.

"You're angry at someone, right?" Oogie said, glancing at them quickly before turning to go back down again. "Then go ahead and do somethin' to him. Release your hate. You're _my_ slaves, you must've learned _somethin'_."

Apparently, he was in a good mood. Oogie clambered back into the depths of his lair, leaving the kids to decide what to do with the axe that was just standing in front of them.

"…should we…do it?" asked Barrel. The three now stood in a circle around the large axe.

"I dunno…he's gonna attack us back. And he's a lot bigger than we are…"

"That's easy. We kill him 'fore he kills us."

"But Lock, what if other people see?"

"Who cares what other people think? No matter what, we'll just work here as usual. They already don't like us, why should we care if they start to hate us?" Lock didn't know about the other two, but he was feeling very frustrated. Oogie was just…just…he just had that kind of effect. After years of wanting to inflict pain back but penning it all in so Oogie wouldn't just, you know, _kill_ him, he finally had a chance to be the torturer instead of the tortured. He finally had a chance for payback for that horrible day he suddenly became subdued.

He stood up and chose a smaller, lighter axe.

The others seemed to at least share some semblance of his feelings, because after a few more minutes of hesitation, they armed themselves as well. The three set out, not entirely sure whether to be grim or excited.

A werewolf was found the next day, maliciously mutilated, his tail removed, his ears several feet away from the rest of him. Before the doctor could come, he died from blood loss.

Oogie Boogie grinned maliciously when they came back, eagerly passing around the tail and exchanging energetic and nervous whispers. He could tell how they felt: scared, since it was their first time, and powerful. Maybe even drunk with power. He couldn't help but reflect that they were like mirrors which he just smashed with rocks, or possibly axes.

They had definitely passed. This is what it should've been like before.

After that, the nature of Lock, Shock and Barrel's jobs grew more…dark. Instead of chores, they went on errands. They fetched things. Mostly living things. And they handed them over to Oogie Boogie and watched and listened and giggled (from a safe distance, of course) as he either played around with them or simply ate them. Of course, the children didn't bring townspeople. It would be impossible to keep kidnapping them covertly. They just nabbed other living things, which were mostly bugs, but sometimes other small animals that seemed to have wandered in unluckily.

Once, when Oogie was bored of simply small animals, they did try kidnapping the Mayor (one of the only men in Halloween Town with no spikes, thorns, claws or any actual defensive mechanisms), but that failed. (Mostly because the Mayor was heavy and they lacked, say, a walking bathtub.) They were caught, chased away, and received the name 'Boogie's Boys' (because Boogie's Children or Boogie's Boys and a Girl weren't the kind of names to whisper nervously in the night).

Oogie's mood grew dangerously darker as time went on, his sadistic needs not being satiated. The trio made sure to stay out of reach of buggy arms (and trapdoors and chained chairs and whips).

And finally, it seemed he had thought of something sinister. The Boogeyman came up to the treehouse again, grinning as if he knew someone was about to sit on a particularly sharp and rusty tack. There was definitely a horrible (in the good or bad way, depending on who you were) plot simmering in his mind.

"I have a _very_ important job for you three, now…"

* * *

Oh my, cliffhanger! This chapter, I feel, had some boring parts, actually. Please review and stuff. Now.


	12. The End

God, it's actually done. Twelve chapters of absolutely confusing weirdness and crap. (Also, it's kinda worthless.) I actually finished this chapter yesterday, with all intention of saying, 'I finished it on the one year anniversary!' But this site thwarted my anal schemes by being buggy. It made me sad for a while, but I got over it. Let's just say I finished this in one year.

Anyways, this is the end. It's not a very good ending, and a bunch of shit comes flying out of nowhere, but hopefully you'll like it. I can honestly say that I tried making badass moments, but the last fight is just...anticlimatic. To me. And short. I would ask for constructive criticism, but I guess that kind of thing doesn't happen much on this site.

* * *

**The End**

"It's a good thing you still come back here," said Billy, sitting in an all-too-uncomfortable armchair in the Sinistham Manor. The boy had grown into a man. He graduated college, had a wife, was thinking about kids, and was now a rather successful policeman. Of course, nothing much happened. Kentucky in general was a pretty lethargic place. "Sometimes I don't have time to come here. Besides, I suck compared to you."

"No, no," his host assured him, raising skeletal hands as if Billy needed consoling. "I'm sure you're disgustingly ghastly."

Billy blinked a little. He always had to get used to the way Jack said certain things. This…this…was a compliment. Hopefully. "Seriously, if you didn't come back once in a while, this place would've sunk into obscurity." Jack frowned, seemingly disliking that hypothetical situation. The eerie manor, as well as several other places around the world, was like a home to him. And it was probably the perfect example of a haunted house, with decaying trees and collapsing floors. It seemed a pity to just let it go to waste, left for people to just bulldoze over.

"Well, it seems not many children are coming here. I'll have to leave soon if I want to get back to town in the morning," said Jack, pushing himself up. Zero, who had been settling down, bored, in the corner, perked up when he saw the skeleton ready to leave.

"Wait," said Billy, suddenly standing up too. He was about to say that Jack had stayed up all night. He was about to say that Jack probably had stayed up all morning. He was about to say that Jack might need some sleep. The cop hesitated because…well…Jack's a skeleton.

Jack was staring at him now, and Billy didn't really want to look like a fool, so he said something else. "…Mind if I come? I mean, I'd really like to see this Halloween place for myself." First rule of cop-land: never believe anything until you see it for yourself. A gullible cop was a bad cop. Besides, this was a chance to finally answer all those questions he thought of at night.

Jack stood with a rather thoughtful look. "I don't mind," he replied. "But you don't like to be scared, right? You may not want to meet the others."

Billy shrugged. "That's fine. I'll just take a quick look from a hill or something." Both satisfied with this plan, they headed out the manor to the graveyard, Zero trailing behind.

Billy raised an eyebrow when Jack opened up some double doors on a statue. Not that he'd been to many graveyards, but he had the impression that these doors led down to crypts filled with dead people. If this assumption was true, he felt this trip would be most unpleasant.

Still, he did not hesitate, and simply followed Jack down into the darkness. At first, he could see nothing and immediately bumped into something that was hopefully not dead, but then Zero's nose shed an orange glow in the dank tunnel. Billy didn't stare, as he was already quite used to these kind of things happening, and the group walked (well, Zero glided) for…well, it seemed like a rather long time. All the while, Billy kept stepping on things that went squish and the roof kept dripping something on his head. How did Jack go through tunnels like these every year and not get his suit messy? The cop's mind boggled.

Finally, there were stairs. Nice stone steps. Okay, so they crumbed, and now bits of rock fell on his head, but at least his shoes and socks weren't getting muddy. Or slimy. Or whatever the tunnel was made of. And now he could see another pair of doors ahead and he couldn't help but get a little excited. He could finally see this supposed 'holiday town.' Finally see it somewhere other than in snippets of dreams. But Billy didn't really show this as he was a cop and he couldn't help but feel that cops were supposed to be rather stoic.

And then there was a thud noise and the orange light flickered. The two turned towards Zero, who was looking as bewildered as they were. The ghost dog experimentally floated forward again and made another audible noise, as if he had just bumped into some kind of thick glass wall.

"What does that mean?" asked Billy, but he turned to empty air. Jack ran up the stairs, able to take many at a time due to his long legs, and slammed open the doors.

Or, he would have, if they had budged, which they stubbornly didn't. Jack aimed his bewildered stare to the doors now.

A few minutes silence, save for the occasional sound of crumbling ceiling.

"…What does that mean?" Billy repeated, heading up to the doors himself while Zero tried to float up the stairs too, as if thinking the barrier would disappear eventually.

"I…uh…" said Jack, getting a very bad feeling in his bones. He tried to push hard against the door again. "…I think the door's blocked."

* * *

For what felt like the fiftieth time that day, Lock, Shock and Barrel stepped back from some entrance now blocked up with random junk they found and circled with white chalk. It was hard work, carrying everything to one place and then making sure that nobody could really get through. They didn't really understand what all of this was for (especially the chalk circles), but hey, who were they to question Oogie?

"Izzat the last one?" sighed Barrel, briefly taking off his skeleton mask to wipe his pale face. The three children had just pushed a broken couch up a hill to a pile in front of a rotten shed's door.

"Yeah, think so," said Lock, collapsing on the couch despite the springs poking out every which way.

"So what do we do now?" Shock sat herself next to Lock to catch her breath.

"Eh, he didn't tell us to do anything else. He'll call us if he needs us. Let's just relax for now, hm?" Lock leaned back lazily into the couch. He ignored the spring digging into his back.

"He said he'd take care of the rest, right? Right when it's the thirty-first? At midnight?" Barrel finally joined the other two on the couch and pulled some candy from his sticky pockets.

The three all agreed that midnight was such a great time to start evil plots and giggled at the thought of what Oogie might do. After all, they weren't the ones about to be in deep shit.

* * *

"Alright then!" the Mayor's voice blared through the megaphone. "Five minutes 'til Halloween! You don't want to miss it!" This announcement wasn't needed as everybody in town was already heading to the town center. The Mayor hopped off his car and travelled with the small crowd until he reached a makeshift stage for him to step on so that he could at least be _seen_ by the others. "Everybody here? Everybody here?" the Mayor shouted needlessly. "Good! Everybody ready for the countdown?" A glance at his watch. "Ready? Starting….five!"

Everybody joined in excitedly. "Four! Three! Two! One!" The bell rang in celebration, but oddly enough, as soon as it started chiming, the stage was covered with smoke.

"A…a smoke bomb?" coughed the Mayor before he was suddenly pushed aside. The smoke quickly cleared away and…there was Oogie Boogie.

The sack man relished the collective gasp aimed at him and he laughed manically.

The crowd was frozen, all staring at a face they hoped to never see again. Finally, the Mayor struggled back up, hatless, and tried to put on a brave and mayor-ly face. It was hard since he was pale and shaking. "You! W-what do you think you're _doing_?" He didn't mean to, but he cringed when Oogie cackled at him.

"This," he replied smugly before turning back to the silent crowd. "Hail your new ruler!"

* * *

"I…I'm going to be late!" Jack wailed, sinking down and setting his skull in his hands. With the dim light from Zero's nose, Billy couldn't help but notice how Jack's pants still stubbornly refused to get dirty. Must be some weird power of his.

"Well," said Billy, unable to exactly sympathize with Jack very well. He wasn't really the type to get super-excited by holidays (at least, not that he remembered). "You've always been saying that there're these other doors, right? We could just try some of those. There're some close by, aren't there?" Jack nodded. "And, at least for you and the others back in town, this is some kind of emergency, right?" Another nod. "Then we can take my car."

Riding in a car was…an interesting experience for Jack. That is to say, it was uncomfortably fast, loud, and terribly disorienting. Often, as he stuttered out the directions, Billy would make a sharp turn, making Jack either slam his side against the door, or almost fall on the weird stick thing, which had a mysterious use. The skeleton decided that he didn't really want to ride in the Mayor's car after all.

They drove to the closest doors they knew of, but the results were all same. Zero would smack into an invisible wall and Jack would find the doors blocked. After checking ten doors, Jack sank to the ground again.

"Hey, don't worry," said Billy, though he had no idea what there was to not worry about. "There're still other doors. C'mon, where's the next closest one?"

"Some place called Pennsylvania."

"Oh. Hm. Then let me try busting that door – "

"It won't work," said the old officer, who had suddenly appeared. He was much older and more fragile-looking than when Jack last saw him. In fact, he was now retired. But everybody still couldn't help but think of him as an officer. Billy stared for a moment.

"…How'd you _get here_?" he managed to blubber out. Not that he wasn't happy to see his ol' mentor, but they had driven miles away from town trying to find an open door, which took hours, even with Billy driving as fast as he could to get an anxious skeleton to some kind of Halloween party (god, that sounded weird) and here was someone who was probably in his eighties by now with no car in sight. Just showed up with no warning. This was very confusing and Billy didn't particularly like being confused.

To his frustration, Billy got no answer. "The door's blocked."

"How d'you know that?"

"It's Oogie Boogie. He's…doing something."

"Who? Doing what?"

"Really? He's out of the tree house? But why would he block the door?"

"_Who is Oogie Boogie?_ And what kind of name is that anyways?!"

"To prevent you from coming back, of course. He doesn't want you meddling in whatever his sick plot is."

"So can I infer that this Oogie Boogie is evil?"

"What? Why would he have a sick plot? Oogie isn't evil!"

"You know, it would be nice if someone would _explain_ something to me."

"Jack, he was _made_ evil. Remember that. You will have to stop him, and you can't let your past experiences with him blind you."

"Oh god, this reminds me of some kind of movie. Wait, is this evil guy that sack boy?"

"But…how am I supposed to stop him? The door's still blocked."

"You know, that's a _very good question_. I wonder if he'll answer! Oh, I know, maybe he took some explosives with him when he magically teleported here!" Realizing that none of his questions will ever be answered, Billy 'aaargh'ed in frustration and started to leave. "Good luck with whatever the hell's going on."

"Wait!" An old wrinkled hand snapped out and caught Billy by the shoulder. "You'll also be needed too."

"Oh good. I almost thought I was going to be completely useless to this 'mission' as I am to this conversation." The old officer turned back to Jack, which didn't surprise Billy in the least.

"I've never told anybody this," and here, the old man's eyes twinkled black, "but I used to live in Halloween Town. I used to be a shadow." And suddenly, the old man was completely black and he dived into the shadows and disappeared, leaving Jack and Billy gaping.

Billy was now utterly confused, a step up from completely confused. He threw his hands up and shouted, "Well _that _came _completely_ out of nowhere!"

"I'm sorry I can't share my life story with you," came the old voice sarcastically from the other side of the doors. "I'm busy clearing all this junk out of the way."

It took less time than Billy expected from an old, crooked man. Whatever had been blocking Zero was gone, and the ghost dog eagerly flew through the door. Jack and Billy went through them normally. The dark and gloomy scenery would have impressed Billy if it wasn't for the fact that his eyes were instinctively drawn to the very large pile of trash. Whoever had blocked the doors had been very patient and had a lot of junk, or at least stole everything in the town's dump. They were on a dark hill of dead grass. A collection of buildings Billy guessed was the town hugged the horizon.

"Quickly, Jack, you better go. I suggest following the sound of screams or maniac laughter."

"Wait, wait," said Billy, determined to get _some_ answers before the day was done. "What are you gonna do?"

The ex-Halloween Towner twisted his mouth into a wrinkled smile. "I'm only an old man now."

"Who happens to be able to travel through shadows," Billy grumbled.

"True, but old humans are fragile, and I happen to an old human right now, shadow-travelling abilities or none."

Jack, who quite frankly had looked very lost for a while, joined in the questioning. "What am I supposed to _do_?" the skeleton whispered, almost fearfully. A bony hand clutched the old man's arm as if in desperation, as if searching for some kind of guide.

The old man looked up at the skeleton with a sagging face of pity. "I can't answer that for you. I can only urge you to hurry."

"Well then," said Billy, sidling up behind Jack. "What am _I_ supposed to do? I'm no one special."

"Why, you have something that nobody here has!"

"A heart?" Billy snarked.

Eyes twinkling black again, the old man clapped a hand on his shoulder and said, "A gun."

* * *

It was incredibly easy to take over the town. Easier than Oogie thought. He expected at least some resistance, but maybe the people were still shaken up over the dead werewolf and the Mayor's almost-kidnap. They were like sheep, really, he mused as he led the townspeople to Finkelstein's tower. Its inhabitants were the only ones who didn't go to celebrate the Halloween countdown. The doctor was becoming quite the shut-in.

Oogie made sure to create the right kind of atmosphere for what was about to happen. He made several people carry torches. Several others wielded pitchforks. And, luckily enough, there was always bad weather in Halloween Town. Perfect.

The sack man beat on the door, satisfied that it gave a threatening, booming sound. Igor opened the thick doors to greet this guest with his usual idiotic grin, which disappeared when he saw the uncomfortable mob. Despite being relatively new to the job, Igor innately knew that a huge mass of people with torches was a Bad Thing. "Yeth?" he lisped cautiously, hoping that there was some kind of mistake and the mob had simply gone to the wrong address.

His hopes were dashed as Oogie bent down, smirking in that disconcerting way. The hunched man couldn't help but think his breath smelled odd. "Why don't ya go and get the doctor, hm?" Igor didn't need to rub two brain cells to know that if he didn't hurry, there was going to be trouble in a form worse than rolled-up newspaper.

Finkelstein was quickly retrieved. The old doctor jerkily rolled to the entrance, grumbling about being interrupted. "What is it," he snapped before fully understanding who he was snapping at. Behind thick glasses, Dr. Finkelstein peered at the looming figure of Oogie and the reluctant crowd behind him.

"What's going on?" he demanded.

"As new ruler of Halloween Town…" Finkelstein's head immediately snapped to the Mayor, who was holding a pitchfork rather uncertainly and staring at the ground as if he _really_ wanted to be somewhere else. "…I'm accusin' you of certain crimes, which you will be hung for and then cremated…"

"What?! Nonsense! I haven't done anything! You can't just make up - " Oogie kicked the wheelchair so Finkelstein shot backwards into the opposite wall and fell over, his clunky chair on top of him. Igor rushed to help the doctor, but stopped when Oogie announced, "Anybody who helps this crook'll be named a traitor and also be executed.

"Someone get 'im to the noose," he ordered, and Lock, Shock and Barrel immediately made their way through the crowd, giggling to themselves. They had never seen a real _hanging_ before…the three quickly wheeled a dazed Finkelstein out the door. The crowd quickly parted for them as they disappeared towards the town center. "All o' you wait for me there." Everybody quickly complied, as they were sure if they didn't, pain would be involved.

Now for other business…

Sally turned from her window when her door opened. She couldn't exactly tell what was going on outside, but she was sure she saw Finkelstein being taken somewhere…

She bit her lip nervously. Oogie Boogie was here. Sally was very sure, inferring from how her father had just been wheeled away, that this was a bad thing. "What are you doing here?" she asked tersely, pushing herself up against the wall. When the sack man entered, a weird smell followed, something like the smell of rotting flesh and blood. It made her even more nervous.

"Why, I'm hurt! Is that any way to treat an old pal?" Oogie sneered, easily blocking the door. "After all, I'm helping you, aren't I?"

Sally narrowed her eyes. She had a feeling he was expecting her to act like a very confused and daft woman confronting a homicidal maniac, asking questions instead of running away. Because the window was closed and latched, she acted as expected. "What do you mean?"

"Why, girlie, you can't tell me you _like_ being locked all year in this boring room." Crap, he was approaching. Sally hoped she could open the window quickly before he could do anything.

"That's why I sneak out every once in a while," she replied, slowly unlatching the window behind her. It usually squeaked. She sure hoped it wouldn't now.

Oogie stopped and made a show of observing some of the large books on her bookshelf. It rather reminded Sally of a clichéd villain. "I'm _king_ now, Sally. Starting today, you won't be locked up in this damn room anymore. You can do whatever you want."

The sincere look in Oogie's eyes then as he turned towards Sally made her pause as she held a window bar, ready to push. Again, she chewed her lip. He…oh my god, Sally thought, wondering whether she should feel guilty about being revolted by this revelation. "And…what are you going to do to my father?"

"Kill 'im," Oogie replied dismissively. Sally suddenly didn't feel very guilty anymore. "Wanna watch?" The sack man extended his arm out to Sally, with a hopeful grin that quite surprisingly had no traces of sadistic glee in it. His eyes, though…and the smell…both struck fear between her stitches.

Escaping would mean, and she was sure of this, that Oogie would then try to kill her the first chance he got. He seemed insane enough to do that and Sally could see him as the 'if I can't have her, nobody can have her' type. Oogie would burn her at the stake…

With no hesitation, Sally roughly pushed the window open and jumped out.

Sally's room was small and Oogie hadn't been very far from her, but he still reacted too slowly to catch her. He watched her fall to the ground in shock, feeling betrayed, but mostly very pissed.

Oogie put his anger to some use. "Traitor! Traitor!" he bellowed, still leaning out the window and glaring down at Sally, who was trying to stitch various parts back together. "Somebody get her! Kill her! Burn her!" But nobody was close by. By the time some townspeople ran back to Finkelstein's tower, by the time Oogie ran down the stairs to the place Sally had fallen, she was gone.

Damn! Oogie kicked the nearby Mayor in frustration and shouted at some werewolves to track her, but they simply replied that they didn't know her scent. They didn't go around deliberately remembering how everybody smelled, after all.

Feeling the need to kill something, Oogie stormed over to the town center with everybody else trailing behind. He stepped up on the makeshift stage which now held a noose, getting some satisfaction seeing the rope around Finkelstein's thin neck. The sack man wrapped a nub around the other end. He was very eager to pull. Mmm, he could just imagine what would happen…the doctor didn't weigh much, so he would probably slowly suffocate, struggling helplessly in the air…

For courtesy's sake, Oogie asked, "Any last words?"

Dr. Finkelstein sat in his bulky wheelchair, staring straight ahead. His beak remained shut.

"Good." And Oogie pulled. He lifted the doctor into the air, where the small man started erratically twitching and tried to grab the noose as if struggling to pull it off. Finkelstein didn't make a sound, not even a pained gurgle, making the night all the gloomier. The only sound was laughter from Boogie's Boys who saw that a hanging was much cooler than they had imagined.

Oogie grinned in pleasure at Finkelstein's pain, but tore his gaze away from the swinging man when he noticed something in the sky. Something was coming down towards him. Very quickly.

Oogie released the rope as if it had just scalded him and jumped out of the way as Finkelstein's body clunked on the floor. The thing that was coming down was huge. It crashed onto the stage, which understandably couldn't hold the weight and collapsed.

"…..You….shall not…….harm the….doctor…..any…longer….."

Hey, he recognized that aggravatingly slow speech pattern…

Oogie stared up from the ground at the large, red eye of what he could only assume was a pissed Goyle.

"Father!" Sally jumped off from Goyle's back to an amazingly alive Finkelstein and checked for bruises on his neck and broken bones and so on.

Well, of course Oogie had been sure that Sally would have tried to rescue her dad, but he didn't expect the large gargoyle at all. How'd the hunk of rock even get out of his attic?!

It wasn't time to ponder these questions, though. He now had three executions to perform. Approaching the group angrily, he was about to shout some more when Goyle swept his large, stony hand across the ground. He didn't do it suddenly, but his hand was so large that Oogie couldn't dodge. The bug man was pushed roughly back to where he was.

"…..You…shall not…." Goyle repeated, but Oogie had no patience to listen.

"Kill them! Topple that bastard over and burn them!" At this, Sally looked up from behind Goyle's arms worriedly. Goyle certainly could continue to push people away, but he had limited vision. A crowd could sneak up from behind. The witches probably had a spell to blow his head off, and then the others could march straight forward, since Sally and Finkelstein would be walled in by their very guardian.

The townspeople were silent, as they had been pretty much all morning. The Mayor glanced morosely at the stoic gargoyle, crouching defiantly, then at the horrible Boogeyman, and suddenly was tired of this shit. He overcame the smell of Fear.

Drawing himself up, the Mayor said, "No."

Everybody was taken aback. The townspeople were unsure now which leader figure to follow.

Oogie looked confused, but was growing exponentially livid. So angry that it seemed possible to boil water off of him. He drew himself up as well, looking much more threatening than the short Mayor. "Are you betraying your _king_?" he asked dangerously.

"No," said the Mayor, adrenaline and panic rushing through his system. He thumped his pitchfork on the ground as emphasis. "We're overthrowing a tyrant."

Oogie could see the others were easily swinging to the Mayor's side. It wasn't that surprising, since they didn't willingly follow him in the first place. They were starting to look more like an angry mob, and some looked ready to throw their torches at him. Oogie did the sensible thing. He ran.

* * *

The truly angry mob chased The Boogeyman through the graveyard, the Mayor leading the way. Oddly enough, those three cackling kids seemed to have disappeared when they saw trouble.

Adrenaline was pumping through the Mayor. He knew there was a damn good reason why they never tried this with Oogie before, but it made him forget. He somehow started catching up despite his short legs. The damn sack man was practically within reach. The Mayor lowered his pitchfork and got ready to thrust it forward…

The Boogeyman was grinning at him. That wasn't good.

With surprising dexterity, Oogie Boogie dodged the pitchfork, grabbed the Mayor's head, and slammed it into a nearby gravestone. The pitchfork fell to the ground.

Ah yes, thought the Mayor, blood running down his pale face. _That's_ why we were so afraid of him…

Adrenaline pushed him back upwards, but Oogie stabbed his torso with the pitchfork, and the Mayor collapsed again and didn't move. Adrenaline can only do so much. "Ha, moron. You're only an elected official. The hell made you think you could stand up to a _king_?"

The townspeople stopped, seeing their felled leader. No matter how angry a mob, nobody really wanted to get stabbed with a pitchfork. They stood like embarrassed sheep as Oogie glared at them. "Right, now why don't we try that again. I suggest you all go back and build a bonfire."

Several shots rang out and Oogie was stumbling backwards, two holes in his body. Bugs were spilling out quickly though he tried to hold them in.

Behind the subdued mob, Billy held his gun steady. Usually police officers were taught to fire warning shots. Billy made sure to warn the sack man that he was shooting him. He got ready to warn some more, wondering when Jack would hurry the hell up already. For a guy with ridiculously long legs, he ran ponderously slowly.

"Lock! Shock! Barrel!" Oogie bellowed. This was all complete nonsense to Billy until three kids jumped from out of nowhere. Two helped tape up the holes in the sack. One stabbed him in the hand with a pitchfork.

Lock picked up the interesting metal thing that the man dropped as he screamed and held his bleeding hand. He had never really seen one before, but it was obvious how it was used. Lock experimented with the strange object by pointing it at the man and pulling the lever. The man went down. Cool.

When the kid saw Jack coming, he scampered away, still clutching his new treasure. Oogie, noticing the skeleton, froze for a minute before shouting at Shock and Barrel to go away.

Jack stared in horror at the bleeding Mayor and Billy and recalled the sight of Sally knelling beside an unconscious Dr. Finkelstein. He couldn't comprehend how this could happen. "Oogie, what are you _doing_?!"

The Boogeyman sneered as Jack pushed his way through the mob before running off again. The skeleton hesitated before turning back to the townspeople and Zero, who had been following him. "Don't follow me. Look after those two," he ordered, before chasing after Oogie. He understood now that Oogie was, frankly, insane and it was extremely unlikely that he would become sane again, no matter what books and children's TV shows said. Once again, Jack felt that this was something he had to do alone.

Oogie Boogie had ran out of sight, but Jack dashed off with certainty. He was sure there was only one place he would run to.

And yes, there he was, standing near the gnarled tree that was his home.

"I was hopin' you'd stay out of the way, but I guess I'll have to kill you now…"

Jack said nothing, for the words would be wasted. He could see from the crazy glint in Oogie's eyes. Instead, he advanced slowly, trying to think of what the hell he was going to do. Kill? How would he kill him? Jack wasn't sure if he could bring himself to do that even with the knowledge that Oogie was a cruel bastard.

"Not even sayin' something? Too good for me?" The Boogeyman's face suddenly twisted into a scowl. "Everythin' went wrong here 'cause of you, you damn bastard. She would've gone with me if it weren't for you," he growled darkly.

Jack was completely taken aback. He had no idea what Oogie was talking about. "What - " the skeleton started, but was interrupted by Oogie's sudden tackle.

The two tumbled around on the dead grass. Oogie was remarkably violent, throwing flurries of punches whenever he saw an opening. With some difficulty, Jack managed to pin him down.

"Look, I don't really want to hurt you, but you're being aggravatingly stubborn. Don't make me do something you'll regret!" Especially since I haven't thought of anything yet, Jack thought.

"Regret? _Me_?" Oogie cackled before suddenly kicking Jack off. The skeleton rolled away and would have fallen down the supposedly bottomless pit surrounding the tree had he not made a desperate grab at the edge. The soil was, as many things were in this world, dead and crumbled under his hands, forcing him to constantly scrabble for a stable hold. Looking back, Jack saw that he might be able to jump to the other side and climb up…

Oogie stepped on one of his hands, dashing that idea skillfully.

"I'm _The_ Boogeyman! _You're_ the one who's gonna regret going against _me_ for the _rest of your short life_!" Reaching down, Oogie seized Jack's free hand and, with a small pop, pulled his arm off. Jack let out a yelp when he suddenly dropped a little, now dangling by one arm. He glanced down into the darkness of the pit, wondering whether it would be worse to fall forever or to smash into pieces where undoubtedly nobody would find him.

Oogie was sneering down at him. Oh god, he was really going to let him fall…

"Oh, don't worry, Jack. I'm sure Halloween Town will be fine without you." Oogie carelessly let the arm in his hand drop to the ground where, after years of friction, it unexpectedly exploded.

Oogie jumped away in surprise, bugs leaking out of his foot now. The explosion had also made Jack's only hold crumble, but the skeleton used his long legs to push off the wall and clutched a large root sticking out the other side. Despite having only one arm, Jack was able to scrabble up and onto stable ground again, and before Oogie knew it, the skeleton was running towards him.

Jack ran into him with the force of a small car and ripped off the tape covering the two holes Billy had shot into him. As some bugs spilled out, he tore more bits of sack off, until glistening beetles and oddly colored bugs were scuttling exposed in the sack, pouring out slowly, panicked and confused, but still managing to keep a vague Oogie shape.

Oogie cackled. "You think this'll stop me? I can come back, Jack. I'll _always_ come back. Don't you understand? I'm _Fear_. I'll outlive you, Jack! I'm _eternal_!" The fallen Boogeyman continued laughing maniacally even as some of his bugs dug into the ground or scrambled away.

"I don't care who you are," Jack replied softly. "I'm not afraid of you. If you come back again, I'll just beat you up. And you'll look foolish in front of the town, and they'll learn not to fear you too. Even when I die, there will still be someone, my children or my neighbor or their children, who will stop you whenever you get the _stupid_ notion in your _tiny_ head that you can decide to kill somebody in our town again."

It was then that Oogie realized that he was truly afraid of something.

Jack stooped to retrieve his arm and strode towards the graveyard as the sun finally rose. He never looked back.

* * *

The tall skeleton's return was met with cheers. The people saw his battle-worn appearance and immediately surrounded him, asking inane questions such as if he was alright and how the fight went and what happened to that damn Oogie Boogie and where were those three kids. Jack found himself too tired to deal with all these questions and so was relieved when the Mayor, despite his wounds, silenced the crowd and walked carefully to him, smiling.

"Jack, you're alright!" Amazingly, Jack thought dazedly, he didn't shout this through a megaphone.

"Yes. How are you and Billy and the doctor?"

"I'm fine, it's not much," the Mayor waved away, though Jack couldn't help but notice the blood-soaked bandages around his head and gut. "They say the boy will heal soon, too, and Dr. Finkelstein…"

"Father just woke up a few minutes ago and complained about his neck," said Sally, moving politely through the crowd to Jack.

"So he will be fine too. More importantly, you defeated him!"

"Oh, not really, I - "

"Don't be so modest, boy! I knew you were going to do great things!"

Jack sighed. He really didn't feel all that great. Sally laid a hand on his shoulder.

"I'm sorry it didn't turn out the way you thought it should," she mumbled.

"Yeah…" Jack replied absent-mindedly. "Mayor, it's been a tiring day, so if you'll excuse me…"

"Oh, but you can't leave yet! We need to celebrate! Today is the day of your coronation!"

Jack let this new bit of information swivel in his skull a bit. "…Huh?" he carefully said.

"Huh?" Sally echoed.

"Well, you defeated Oogie, so of course you need a reward…so what better reward than the title of Pumpkin King? I'm sure the others agree with me!" Taking their cue, the townspeople announced their 'Yea!'s and 'Damn straight!'s.

"But…" Jack stuttered bewilderedly, very sure that he didn't really want this title.

No matter how he protested though, the townspeople just didn't seem to listen. Soon there was a crazy party and Jack was wearing a stupid crown and throughout the whole shindig he had gone through a whirlwind of enthusiastic handshakes and finally he was sitting besides Billy at the fountain. Billy was indeed fine and would heal nicely, as the Mayor had said, but he looked uncomfortable and stared warily at some denizens walking (or flying or stalking or lurking) around.

"Sorry about what happened to you..." Jack said morosely, fingering the stupid crown on his skull.

"Hm?" Billy tore his eyes away from a man which either was covered with a lot of mud or was made of melting toffee. "Oh, that's okay. I wasn't really expecting to come out of this unharmed." He looked in his cup that somebody forced into his hands and slowly poured the contents into the fountain. After a few seconds of thought, he also dropped the cup, which immediately started swimming around.

"I didn't mean for you to get shot," said the shadow-officer, who had suddenly materialized next to Billy. The younger man jumped half a foot and then doubled over because jumping wasn't good for a shot wound in the gut. Both the old man and the skeleton gently helped him sit down. "Sorry for that."

"I'm okay, I'm okay," Billy grunted. "What are you doing here?"

"Well, I'm not about to let someone as injured as you drive back home himself," the old man replied. "Tell me when you're ready and I'll drive you home."

Billy wanted to say that he had been ready ever since he was shot, but he kept that to himself. Instead he grumbled, "What am I gonna tell my wife? And everybody at work?" There was a few moments silence. Billy sighed again. "Hectic day…"

"You could tell them that somebody attacked you in the street," Jack suggested, stirring the contents of his cup with a bony finger.

"Maybe. Guess I'll find out. Hey…Mr. Unlucky." Jack grinned a little at the old nickname. "…See ya around, I guess. Good luck with the king thing." And the two left.

Sally replaced them shyly and stayed silent for a while. "What are you going to do?" she finally asked.

"Hm?"

"I mean…are you going to run away again?"

"I can't, Sally. If he thinks I'm gone for good, he'll attack again. And these people can't fight back yet."

"Oh." Sally stared at the ground, unsure what to say now. She wondered if she should confess…but no, she couldn't do that. Jack was burdened with enough for one day. Then again, he was king now. How busy would he be? Would she have another chance to tell him after this? But looking at the skeleton's weary face, she couldn't bear to drop another surprise on him.

Sally settled for setting her head on his shoulder and they both watched the party move around them, chattering and laughing. It seemed they were the only two in Halloween Town who didn't feel like celebrating.


End file.
